Lycopene extraction from waste of capia peppers used in food industry

In this thesis study, the extraction of lycopene from the food factory waste of red pepper, which has not an economical value, was examined by using batch stirred, soxhlet and ultrasound assisted extractors and systems are compared in terms of rates and efficiencies. The red pepper paste waste obtained from the OLCA Paste Factory was used as wet, frozen and dried forms in experimental studies. In the batch stirred extraction studies lycopene extraction from wet, frozen and dried waste forms of red pepper waste was investigated, and it was decided to use the dried waste in all other experiments. The effects of BHT presence, particle size range, stirring rate, temperature, liquid/solid ratio, extraction time and the type of solvent on the lycopene extraction rate and yield were examined in the lycopene extraction from dried waste. From the batch stirred extraction studies the highest extractable lycopene capacity and lycopene extraction yield of the red pepper waste were determined as 1634.16 mg lycopene/kg dry waste and 0.163%, respectively, at the liquid/solid ratio of 15:1, at 60°C and 120 rpm using with ethyl acetate solvent. In soxhlet extraction studies, the effects of BHT presence, particle size range, liquid/solid ratio, extraction time and type of solvent on the lycopene extraction rate and yield from dried red pepper waste were investigated. From the soxhlet extraction studies the highest extractable lycopene capacity and lycopene extraction yield of the red pepper waste were found as 1723.25 mg lycopene/kg dry waste and 0.172%, respectively, at the liquid/solid ratio of 15:1 using with ethyl acetate solvent at its boiling temperature. In ultrasound assisted extractions studies, the effects of types of solvents at different liquid/solid ratios on the lycopene extraction rate and yield from dried red pepper waste were recearched. From the ultrasound assisted extraction studies the highest extractable lycopene capacity and lycopene extraction yield of the red pepper waste were assigned as 1952.08 mg lycopene/kg dry waste and 0.195%, respectively, at the liquid/solid ratio of 20:1 using with ethyl acetate solvent at 60°C. It was seen that second order kinetic model described the extraction kinetics of the batch stirred and the ultrasound assisted extractions very well and first order kinetic model described the extraction kinetics of soxhlet extraction exactly. At the last part of the thesis study, in batch stirred extraction using with ethanol as solvent, the combined effects of selected independent variables such as stirring rate, temperature, liquid/solid ratio and extractiın time on the amount of lycopene extracted from per unit dried waste were analyzed by using Responce Surface Methodology. A second-order quadratic polynomial equation giving the amount of lycopene extracted from per unit dried waste were derived and three dimensional response curves were obtained. The results of proposed model were evaluated statistically by ANOVA test. Response Surface Methodology for all extractors studied was used again to investigate the combined effects of kind of extractor, solvent type and liquid/solid ratio selected as the independent variables on the dependent variable of amount of lycopene extracted per unit dried waste.