Kinetics and Mechanisms of Protease Assisted Aqueous Extraction of Soybean Oil

摘要

The objectives of this research were to identify mechanisms of oil release and determine optimal conditions for free oil yield for enzyme-assisted aqueous extraction of soybean oil as a basis for rational process design and optimization. Light microscopy (LM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) were used to study the effects of physical treatments on cellular disruption, to identify extraction barriers, and to deduce important extraction parameters. Selected extraction parameters were optimized using Response Surface Design. Parameters included solid-liquid ratio, enzyme/substrate ratio and agitation rate. All parameters tested had significant effects for both extraction yield and demulsification yield, although solid-liquid ratio had by far the largest effect. The demulsification step had the most influence on determining optimal parameter values for overall free oil yield. Kinetic experiments showed that the extraction could be modeled as a two-pool model with first order kinetics.