Philippine E-Journals

Essential Oil was extracted by Supercritical Carbon Dioxide (SC-CO2) from air-dried Lemongrass (leaves and stems separately). The statistical experimental design with 23 factorials was formulated using Design-Expert Software (version 7.0.1). The effects of temperature, pressure and size of raw material were analyzed employing the Response Surface Methodology (RSM) technique. The extraction yield increased when pressure was increased and temperature was decreased for both leaves and stems of lemongrass. The models of extraction for both leaves and stems were established with the yield and citral content of the essential oil as the responses. The optimum extraction conditions were found to be 35.14°C, 11.1 MPa and 4.07 mm of particles size for leaves and 50°C, 11.1 MPa and 8mm for particles size of stems.