SCALE-UP OF SFE FROM Capsicum PEPPER USING SUPERCRITICAL CARBON DIOXIDE

The challenge of finding scale-up criteria that allow reproducing laboratory data at higher scales is extremely important for the industrial supercritical fluid extraction (SFE) processes. The objective of this work is to investigate the scaleup of SFE from Capsicum frutescens pepper using supercritical CO2, and to evaluate the extraction kinetic curves of oleoresin and capsaicinoids of the large scale extraction. Extractions were performed at laboratory and pilot scale at 15 MPa and 40 °C, and their curves are compared in terms of yield and kinetics, also using mathematical modeling. The scale-up criterion adopted in this study was to keep constant the ratio between solvent flow rate and substrate feed (Q/F), considering that diffusion would be the controlling mechanism. The broken and intact cell model of Sovová (1994) was applied to fit the extraction curves. The applied model fitted well to experimental data, nevertheless the values of the modeled parameters for small and large scale curves reveal differences between both processes. The most outstanding differences appear in the constant extraction period (tCER) and in the convective mass transfer coefficient (kf). The possible reasons that led to those differences can be related to SFE bed packing procedure, different separation methods of the small and large scale equipment and extraction bed geometry. The yields for the small and large scale were 3.97(±0.09) and 4.18(±0.04), respectively. By analyzing the kinetic extraction curve in the large scale, it can be observed that at 135 min of extraction, more than 85 % of total capsaicinoids were obtained.