Investigation of Process Variables in Supercritical Carbon Dioxide Extraction of Soybeans using a Teledyne Isco Syringe Pump and Extraction Module

Soybean oil is one of the most widely used plant oils today. Most soybean oil is extracted using hexane solvent extraction; while being fast and efficient, this has several disadvantages. Supercritical CO2 offers an attractive alternative for extraction with smaller environmental and health impacts because it is nontoxic, non-flammable, cheap, and readily removed from the extract. This application note aims to optimize process conditions to reduce the energy cost to extract soybeans, including the amount of supercritical CO2, using Teledyne Isco’s 260D syringe pump and SFX-2-10 extraction module.