Improvement of Technologies for Isolation and Purification of Biologically Active Substances from Plant Raw Materials
Authors: Turmanidze G. N. , Sorokin V. V. , Stepanov K. S. , Ignatenko M. A. 
Published: October 2023

Introduction. Improving the technologies for isolating and purifying biologically active substances from plant materials is an important task for the pharmaceutical, food and cosmetic industries. Technology development often requires changes to the design of existing equipment. During the modernization of equipment for the implementation of new technologies, it is possible to improve its configuration, which makes it possible to significantly increase the yield of active substances at minimal cost. To increase the efficiency of the process of isolating hesperidin from plant materials, we proposed to use a number of technological solutions. In particular, it is proposed to use mixing devices with the configuration of impellers obtained by computational fluid dynamics, when using a Soxhlet extractor to use a heated extraction chamber, by adding an external coil jacket, which makes it possible to regulate the temperature inside the extraction chamber to accelerate the processes of diffusion and mass transfer, and to select the solvent and extractant on the basis of thermodynamic models by calculation.

Aim. Improving the technology for isolating and purifying hesperidin from plant materials using modernized equipment.

Materials and methods. Flow distribution in extraction apparatuses was modeled using computational fluid dynamics methods. To evaluate the results obtained on the basis of modeling, a number of experiments were carried out, the object of which was the peel of an orange (dried flavedo and albedo, grinding degree 0.1–0.2 mm, moisture content 3.5 %). The quantitative content of the flavonoid complex in terms of hesperidin was determined by direct spectrophotometry at a wavelength of 290 nm, the quantitative content of hesperidin was determined gravimetrically. Statistical data processing was performed using Minitab v21 software (Minitab Inc., USA), differences were considered statistically significant at p < 0.05.

Results and discussion. Based on the methods of computational fluid dynamics, to intensify the processes of mixing and dissolution at the stages of preliminary degreasing of raw materials and extraction, a six-bladed impeller was designed, which makes it possible to accelerate these processes by creating axial and radial flows of fluid movement in a capacitive apparatus and maintaining raw materials in suspended state in the volume of liquid at low mixing speeds and energy consumption. Equipping the extraction chamber with a coiled jacket made it possible to significantly increase the solubility of the active substance and extract more of the target component in one extraction cycle. A technology for the isolation and purification of hesperidin was developed, and the parameters of the processes were determined and optimized.

Conclusion. As a result of the study, it was shown that it is possible to intensify the processes of extraction and dissolution of active substances by selecting mixing devices using the method of computational fluid dynamics. To isolate poorly soluble compounds from dense raw materials (roots, bark, etc.), a modification of the Soxhlet apparatus with a heated extraction chamber was proposed. Modernization of typical technological units made it possible to obtain the substance of hesperidin with a yield of up to 95 % and a purity of up to 90 % with a single recrystallization.