Effects of pre-treatments on the yield and carotenoid content of Gac oil using supercritical carbon dioxide extraction

The effects of air-drying temperature, particle size and enzymatic pre-treatment on the oil yield and content of carotenoids in the resultant Gac oil using supercritical CO 2 extraction method were investigated. It was found that the highest oil yield was obtained when using the enzyme concentration at 0.1% (w/w) for pretreatment before air-drying. Furthermore, the content of carotenoids was also enhanced by suitable drying temperature and the particle size. High oil yield (34% g/g) and high content of β-carotene (83 mg/100 mL oil) and lycopene (508 mg/100 mL oil) were obtained using the drying temperature of 50 °C and particle size of 0.45 mm as pre-treatments prior to SC-CO 2 extraction at pressure of 200 bar and extraction temperature of 50 °C. Results also indicated that the most suitable extraction time was 120 min. It was concluded that Gac oil containing high amount of carotenoids could be extracted using the chosen air-drying temperature, particle size, enzymatic pre-treatment and extraction time.