Modeling and kinetics of microwave assisted leaching based oil extraction from Bhat

Abstract

AbstractA polar green solvent based Microwave assisted oil extraction from low oil content source like bhat seed is one of the novel and sustainable approach. The understanding of exact mechanism of mass transfer and hence oil extraction is vital for its industrial scale application. The kinetics of oil extraction and their modeling is carried out in present investigation. The MAE of oil from different size particles (<1, 2, and 4 mm) of bhat seed sample was carried out through isopropanol as solvent. Fick's law based model and two stage (washing and diffusion) extraction based empirical model was fitted to the experimental data. Fick's law shown the best fit to all three particle sizes with R2 .98, .98, and .97, respectively. The diffusion rate was observed to be decreased from 0.54 to 0.26 min−1 with increase in particle size. Empirical model shown that the washing stage was most predominant over diffusion with extraction rate few hundred times the diffusion.Practical ApplicationIn recent years, microwave assisted extraction (MAE) attracts the industrial interest because of various advantages. But, the phenomenon of MAE is considerably different than conventional solvent extraction. The understanding of insight in to the process of mass transfer kinetics taking place during extraction is the key requirement for design and scale‐up of the extraction system. Therefore, the present investigation understands the mass transfer and extraction dynamics taking place at molecular level especially in low oil content source, which will help for large‐scale commercial design of MAE systems.