Brewer’s spent grain (BSG) was chemically characterized obtaining 52.1% of carbohydrates, 17.8% protein, 5.9% lipids, 13.5% insoluble lignin and 24.3% of water-soluble extractives. This work has been focused on the study of polyphenol extraction of the extractive fraction by water ultrasound-assisted extraction. Selected extraction conditions were 47 °C and 21.7 mL water/gdry-BSG. The effect of solvent polarity on polyphenol extraction was studied by using ethanol aqueous mixtures, from 20% to 100% ethanol. The kinetics of polyphenol extraction have been fitted to the power law and the Weibull models yielding mean values of the root mean square deviation lower than 7.5%. Extracts have been characterized in terms of quantification of individual phenolic compounds by HPLC-DAD and protein and sugar soluble fractions (glucose, xylose, and arabinose). Polyphenol profile has been compared with other hydrolytic techniques, such as acid, basic and enzymatic hydrolysis, showing that ultrasound was not as effective as basic hydrolysis to release the phenolic acids esterified to the cell wall. A further centrifuge ultrafiltration concentration step was able to yield a retentate enriched in the protein fraction while individual phenolic compounds where mainly transferred to the permeate.
