Microwave-assisted ionic liquids pretreatment followed by hydro-distillation for the efficient extraction of essential oil from Dryopteris fragrans and evaluation of its antioxidant efficacy in sunflower oil storage

Abstract

With strong dissolution abilities of ionic liquids to plant cell walls, an integrated microwave-assisted ionic liquids pretreatment followed by hydro-distillation method (MILP–MHD) was performed for the efficient extraction of essential oil from the rare Dryopteris fragrans. Under optimal conditions, this innovative MILP–MHD provided the remarkable superiority of much higher yield (0.91%) of D. fragrans essential oil (DEO) within much shorter extraction duration (14.2min) than those of the reported solvent-free microwave extraction technique (0.33% and 94min). Furthermore, the antioxidant efficacy of DEO in the stabilization of sunflower oil was determined and found to be comparable to the commonly-employed α-tocopherol (VE) but a little lower than the synthetic antioxidant butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT). Therefore, MILP–MHD is a potential and highly efficient technique for the extraction of valuable essential oils in flavor food industries and DEO can be explored as a potent natural antioxidant additive for edible oils or lipid foods storage.