Solubilities in supercritical carbon dioxide of the predominant carotenes in tomato skin were measured. The use of a polymeric C 30 RP-HPLC column to analyze the tomato extract made it possible to separate several geometric isomers from each carotene extracted. The Chrastil model was used to assign a solubility equation to each extracted carotene. Different solubility behaviors in supercritical carbon dioxide were shown by carotenes depending on their nature and configuration. The most soluble carotene was all-trans-phytoene and the least soluble was all-trans-lycopene. Significant differences in solubility were observed between the trans and cis isomers of lycopene. The results indicate that a fractionation of the tomato skin carotenes can be achieved by using supercritical CO 2 extraction.Paper no. J10111 in JAOCS 79, 897-902 (September 2002).
KEY WORDS:Carotenes, solubility, supercritical carbon dioxide, tomato.
EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURESReagents. Lycopene, 90-95% purity, and α-tocopherol, 99% purity, were obtained from Sigma Chemical (St. Louis, MO); and all-trans-β-carotene, 97% purity, and β-apo-8′-carotenal, 98% purity, were purchased from Fluka Chemical (Buchs, Switzerland). All HPLC-grade solvents, including methanol, dichloromethane, and methyl t-butyl ether (MTBE), were FIG. 2. Carotene contents in the extract obtained using a 313 K extraction vessel temperature and 400 g/L CO 2 density. (A) HPLC chromatogram of phytofluene monitored at 347 nm, and (B) HPLC chromatogram of phytoene peaks at 285 nm. The numbered peaks are tentatively assigned to (1) all-trans-phytofluene; (1') cis-phytofluene; (2) α-tocopherol; (3) all-trans-phytoene; (3') cis-phytoene.