Food and Public Health 2012, 2(6): 231-240 DOI: 10.5923/j.fph.20120206.08 Pressurized Organic Solvent Extraction with On-line Particle Formation by Supercritical Anti Solvent Processes Diego T. Santos , Dayane F. Barbosa , Ketllen Broccolo, M. Thereza M. S. Gomes , Renata Vardanega , M. Angela A. Meireles * Lasefi/Dea/Fea (School of Food Engineering)/UNICAMP (University of Campinas) Cidade Universitária "Zeferino Vaz",R. Monteiro Lobato, 80; 13083-862, Campinas, SP, Brazil Abstract In this work, anovel on-line process for pressurised hot organic solvent extraction of antioxidants from plantsas well as precipitation of the extract with or without a carrier material in one step was developed. This process has been called OEPO,Organic solvent Extraction and On-line particle formation. With this process, different products with a very low residual organic solvent concentration (< 50 ppm) can be obtained by the use of supercritical CO 2 as anti solvent for solvent elimination.OEPO process consists of hyphenated Pressurized Liquid Extraction (PLE)-Supercritical Anti Solvent (SAS) precipitation, PLE-SAS co-precipitation and PLE-Supercritical Fluid Extraction of Emulsions (SFEE). OEPO process was successfully developed using Brazilian ginseng roots (Pfaffiaglomerata)as a model case using ethyl acetate as extracting solvent. Results were compared, in terms of antioxidant activity or morphology, with the ones obtained by each process separately.In addition, an optimization study for antioxidants recovery was performed using ethyl acetate as extracting solvent during PLE process. Optimum PLE extracts were produced under moderate extraction temperature (373 K) and high static extraction time (15 min). Under this condition an extraction yield of 1% (dry basis, d.b.) and an antioxidant activity of 53% are obtained, which was approximately 14% higherthan that observed after PLE-SAS precipitation and after SAS precipitation performed in two steps (step one - PLE extraction; step two – SAS precipitation by the use of the extract solution produced by step one stored).Similar behavior (hyphenated process producing similar products than the two step process done separately) was observed for PLE-SAS co-precipitation and PLE-SFEE indicating that the OEPO process developed in this work can be considered as a suitable and promising process to obtain, in only one step, different products (precipitated extract, co-precipitated extract or encapsulated extract in suspension), directly from plant materials. Keywords PLE, SAS, SFEE, Supercritical Fluids, Bioactive Compounds, Hyphenated Processes 1. Introduction Nowadays, the demand for natural bioactive compounds is increasing due to their use in the functional food industry. Natural components from plants are employed, including different functional activities, for instance,antioxidantactivi ty, antimicrobial activity, anti-cancer, or neurodegenerative diseases prevention, among others[1]. Ginseng species is one of the most appreciated natural sources for this kind of compounds.The most known Ginseng species in the world belongs to thePanax genus, which have been used for thousands years by folk medicine. Asian ginseng (Panax ginseng), American ginseng ( Panax quinquefolius ) roots arerenowned and widely used herbs in China, United States, * Corresponding author: meireles@fea.unicamp.br (M. Angela A. Meireles) Published online at http://journal.sapub.org/fph Copyright © 2012 Scientific & Academic Publishing. All Rights Reserved Canada, etc.[2]. Species of the genus Pfaffia (Amaranthaceae) has been commercialized as substitutes for Panax (ginseng, Araliaceae). Due to the similar morphology of its roots to those of ginseng, they are popularly known as “Brazilian ginseng”. Around 90 species of Pfaffia are known in Central and South America[3]. In Brazil, 27 species have been described, being Pfaffia glomerata the most important specie. Since besides similarity in appearance Brazilian ginseng roots (Pfaffia glomerata) extracts have also similar effects to ginseng, large amounts of this plant material are being exported for production of their extracts[4]. Different classical extraction techniques have been applied to obtain antioxidant extracts from Pfaffia glomerata roots[5-7]. Classical extraction methods are time- and solvent-consuming and may promote extract degradation during the extraction process. On the other hand, pressurized liquid extraction (PLE) technique enables the rapid extraction (less than 30 min) of analytes in a closed and inert