Enriching β-carotene from fatty acid esters mixture of palm oil using supercritical CO2 in the silica-packed column

A green approach of using supercritical CO2 in a silica-packed column via adsorption and desorption steps has been developed to enrich beta-carotene in the 10% beta-carotene concentrate made from crude palm oil. In the adsorption stage, the yield of the beta-carotene poor fraction with the content of 3% was 82.2% when the pressure, temperature, CO2 flow rate and the time were 25 MPa, 60 degrees C ,3kg/h, and 180 min, respectively. The rich beta-carotene fraction adsorbed in the column was thoroughly extracted out by supercritical CO2 when the pressure, temperature, flow rate and time were 35 MPa, 70 degrees C 3 kg/h, and 120 min, respectively, in which the beta-carotene content reached 27% and the yield reached 22.3%. This two-step process is an efficient way to prepare natural beta-carotene with high content and has potential applications in the concentration of value-added components.