Dates palm fruits: A review of their nutritional components, bioactivities and functional food applications

Date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) is a fruit bearing tree with a lot of prospects. Its fruits, and seeds otherwise known as pit and byproducts are made up of nutritional and medicinal potentials. In terms of commercial value, date fruit have not been fully utilized as a good functional ingredient to produce numerous health promoting diets. Meanwhile, date fruits and seeds are rich in nutrients such as amino acids, vitamins, minerals, dietary fiber, phenolics, etc. Dates possess a lot of bioactivity potentials e.g. antimicrobial, antioxidant, anticancer, antidiabetic, etc. These bioactivities are enhanced by the presence of phytochemicals such as carotenoids, phenolic acid, flavonoids, tocopherol, phytosterols, etc. In ancient times, date fruits were widely applied for orthodox and traditional therapeutic purposes. Similarly, dates have been used as functional ingredients in some newly developed foods and for other purposes. All of this were reviewed and presented in this article. This detailed information will improve the worth of date fruits, seeds and byproducts as cheap sources of natural diet that can function both as nutritive and bioactive ingredients in the food sector, pharmaceutical industries and for other purposes.