The cultivation of the date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) is the main activity and source of livelihood for people from arid and semiarid regions of the world. Date production is increasing every year. In addition, pitted date exportation is rising and great amounts of date seeds are produced. This biomass represents a problem for manufacturing companies. At the moment, date seeds are normally discarded or used as animal feed ingredients. However, this co-product can be used for many other applications due to its valuable chemical composition. Oil is one of the most interesting components of the date seed. In fact, date seeds contain 5–13% oil. Date seed oil contains saturated and unsaturated fatty acids with lauric and oleic as the main ones, respectively. Tocopherols, tocotrienols, phytosterols, and phenolic compounds are also present in significant amounts. These phytochemicals confer added value to date seed oil, which could be used for many applications, such as food product formulations, cosmetics, and pharmaceuticals. This review provides up-to-date data on the different extraction techniques and the chemical composition of date seed oils. The applications of date seed oil have also been reviewed.

The phytochemical composition of leaves, stems, pericarps and rhizomes ethanolic extracts of Asparagus acutifolius were characterized by HPLC-DAD-MS. A. acutifolius samples contain at least eleven simple phenolics, one flavonon, two flavonols and six steroidal saponins. The stem extracts showed the highest total phenolic acid and flavonoid contents, where cafeic acid and rutin were the main compounds. No flavonoids were detected in the leaf, pericarp or rhizome while caffeic acid and ferulic acid were the predominant. Steroidal saponins were detected in the different plant parts of A. acutifolius, and the highest contents were found in the rhizome extracts. The stem extracts exhibited the highest antioxidant activity against 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) and the highest 2,2-azino-bis (3 ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid) (ABTS) scavenging activity was found in the pericarp extracts. The rhizome and leaf extracts showed a potent cytotoxic activity against HCT-116 and HepG2 cell lines. Moreover, the pericarp and rhizome extracts revealed a moderate lipase inhibitory activity. The leaf and rhizome extracts were screened for their antimicrobial activity against human pathogenic isolates. The leaf extract exhibited a powerful inhibitory activity against all the bacteria and fungi tested.