Enzymatic Interesterification: Confirmation Experiments Following a Fractional Factorial Design

PACHECO, CONSUELO; CRAPISTE, GUILLERMO; CARRIN, M.E.

Phoenix, USA

Congreso; 101 th AOCS annual meeting; 2010

AOCS

In the present work the effect of certain reaction parameters over the enzymatic interesterification of fully hydrogenated soybean oil and liquid soybean oil was studied. The experiments were performed with a 27-2IV fractional factorial design with two replicates. The design factors considered were: enzyme concentration (A), immobilized enzyme type (B), reaction time (C), substrate mass ratio (D), temperature (E), agitation level (F) and moisture content (G). The reaction products were analyzed with respect to melting point (m.p.), byproducts (free fatty acids, mono- and diglycerides) and triglyceride content and seven models were obtained. It was determined that the reaction conditions to obtain minimal m.p. and minimal byproducts generation should be: 5% enzyme (w/wsubst), Lipozyme RM IM, 24 h, 70% oil (w/w), 65ºC, low agitation level and absence of molecular sieves. A confirmation assay to test the accuracy of the developed models was performed at this point of the design space obtaining that the measured responses fell inside the corresponding prediction intervals, validating the models.