INVESTIGADORES
PEREDA Selva
congresos y reuniones científicas
Título:
Theoretical Study of the Fractionation of Glycerol Laurates Using SC-CO2
Autor/es:
F. A. SANCHEZ; N. COTABARREN; HEGEL, P. E.; S. PEREDA
Lugar:
Cordoba
Reunión:
Conferencia; VI Iberoamerican Conference on Supercritical Fluids; 2023
Institución organizadora:
Universidad Nacional de Córdoba
Resumen:
Glycerol monolaurate, known as monolaurin, is a monoglyceride of significant importance due to its antimicrobial properties and its application as non-ionic surfactants, in cosmetics, and dietary supplements. An attractive route for its production is the direct esterification of glycerol with lauric acid. However, this reaction is reversible, resulting in the presence of reactants along with the three glycerol laurates as reaction products. Among the possible separation methods, supercritical carbon dioxide (SC-CO2) extraction stands out for its selectivity and ease of system removal. Previous studies have demonstrated the selectivity of SC-CO2 in the separation of mixtures of mono- and diglycerides of carboxylic acids with different molecular weights.The objective of this work is to evaluate the selectivity of SC-CO2 in separating the key com-ponents of the reactive mixture, including water, glycerin, lauric acid, and the three glycerol laurates. Due to limited experimental information on these systems, the use of a predictive model is required. In this study, we employed the Group Contribution with Association Equa-tion of State (GCA-EOS) to thermodynamically model the system. Previous studies have shown the effectiveness of this model in predicting phase equilibria of related compounds, such as triglycerides and biodiesel in the presence of CO2. Moreover, it has been utilized to assess the selectivity of CO2 in the separation of the three glycerol acetates.In this work, we evaluate the effect of temperature, pressure, and solvent ratio for designing a feasible phase scenario for fractionation of glycerol laurates. The phase equilibrium engineer-ing allows for the decoupling of the variable effects, which is crucial in designing future ex-periments regarding the fractionation of reaction products.
