Nano-ZnO impregnated – cellulose acetate hybrid membrane for increasing eugenol content in clove oil

Abstract

Clove oil is an essential oil that is obtained from cloves leaf. Indonesia is one of the largest producer of clove oil in the world. However, the quality of clove oil which is directly obtained from cloves leaf has low quality. This is due to the low concentration of eugenol in crude clove oil that is 60-80%. The purpose of this research is to increase the quality of clove oil by increasing the concentration of eugenol. In this research, clove oil is being purified by using Cellulose Acetate (CA)-ZnO nanofiltration membrane. The membranes were fabricated by dry-wet phase inversion method from dope polymer solution in acetone. The SEM results revealed the formation of nano-particles framework among the polymer matrix. The additions of 0.5 wt-% of nano-ZnO slightly increase the content of eugenol in permeate from 69% to 72%. However, the further addition of nano-ZnO decreases the content of eugenol drastically to 69% (no separation occurs) with the addition of 1.0 and 1.5 wt-%. The addition of high concentration of nano-ZnO (more than 0.5 wt-%) will produce large nano-particle cluster with macro-voids around the cluster which decreases the membrane selectivity.