Modeling of supercritical carbon dioxide extraction of piperine from Malabar black pepper

Optimization of supercritical carbon dioxide extraction parameters for ‘piperine’ extraction from Malabar black pepper ( Piper nigrum L.) has been conducted by a three-level full factorial design. The optimized conditions obtained were: 20 g pepper, mean particle diameter 0.42 mm, 300 bar, 60°C, 45 min extraction time and 2 L/min flow rate of gaseous CO 2 . A correlated Chrastil equation has been generated to predict solubility of piperine in SC-CO 2 under different extraction conditions. The extraction curve followed plug flow model. Extraction kinetics followed Higuchi model. The packed bed was characterized using an empirical correlation ( r =0.96) among Re, Sc and Sh numbers.