Utilization of the supercritical carbon dioxide extraction technology for the production of deoiled palm kernel cake

Abstract The main focus of the present study is to produce deoiled palm kernel cake from palm kernel using the supercritical carbon dioxide (SC CO 2 ) extraction method. Response surface methodology (RSM) was used to optimize the process parameters of SC CO 2 extraction of oil from palm kernels. The influences of pressure, temperature and extraction time on the yield were investigated. Results showed that the experimental data were fitted into the second order polynomial model. The linear terms of SC CO 2 pressure, temperature and extraction time had the significant effect on the yield of the oil extraction from the palm kernel. The optimum SC CO 2 extraction process parameters were pressure 44.6 MPa, temperature 60 °C and extraction time 50 min. Under these experimental conditions, the oil yield was about 49.2%. The presence of nutrient and anti-nutrient compositions in deoiled PKC subjected to SC CO 2 (PKC sc ) was also investigated and compared with the nutrient and anti-nutrient compositions of PKC collected from palm oil mill (PKC M ). Determination of the nutrient compositions in deoiled PKC sc and PKC M revealed that SC CO 2 maintained the nutrient compositions in deoiled PKC sc during extraction of palm kernel oil. Determination of the anti-nutrients compositions in deoiled PKC sc and PKC M showed that SC CO 2 effectively influenced the anti-nutrients in deoiled PKC sc . The findings of the present study suggest that SC CO 2 extraction is an effective technique to produce deoiled PKC sc , which can be used as a cheap source of protein and fiber for human and animal food consumption.