Solubility of passion fruit (Passiflora edulis Sims)seed oil in supercritical CO2

Abstract

Supercritical fluid extraction (SFE)of crude oil from vegetable by-products have gained attention since they enhance the recovery of bioactive compounds with potential application in food and cosmetics with the utilization of a green solvent, CO2. Crude passion fruit seed oil (CPFO)obtained from by-products is a rich source of bioactive compounds. However, phase equilibrium data of this vegetable oil are scarce in the literature. This work obtained phase equilibrium data of CPFO in supercritical CO2 (sc-CO2)using two methods: dynamic and static synthetic. Experimental pressures were 20, 22.5 and 25 MPa and temperatures were 313, 323 and 333 K. Moreover, a literature review has been made to compare CPFO solubility with the reported solubilities of some pure bioactive compounds of interest. The pressure of 25 MPa provided the highest oil solubility for all evaluated temperatures (313–333 K), and the crossover phenomenon was observed at temperatures above 323 K. The findings of this work also indicate that fatty acid composition is mostly related to oil solubility than to minor compounds present in CPFO