Enhancing the Hydrolysis of Africa Pear Seed Oil

Abstract

Recent trend in terms of waste seed oil application has shown vast industrial relevance. Therefore, the high fatty acid concentration of African Pear (Dacryodes edulis) Seed-oil (APSO) is the reason for its utilization, thereby according it the possible potential as feedstock for industrial applications. However, pretreatment of the oil extract is key to its functionality as feedstock in industrial processes. Therefore the process of hydrolysis as a pretreatment route based on the types of catalysts, and a variety of reaction circumstances, including concentration, temperature as well as reaction time was adopted and characterization was affirmed with FTIR and GC-MS analytical methods. The results showed that the highest percentage Free Fatty Acid (% FFA) hydrolysis was obtained at optimum concentration (2 M), temperature (60 oC) and reaction time (2 hrs). Rapid hydrolysis was observed at 1.5 M for both ethanolic KOH and NaOH, thereby reporting a percentage yield of 70.58 % and 63.37 % of the % FFA for KOH and NaOH respectively. Further characterization findings by GC-MS confirmed a positive identification of % FFA composition. Likewise the FTIR analysis also exhibited high carboxylic acid peak absorption for NaOH and KOH catalyst at 1781 cm-1 and 1179 cm-1 respectively. Therefore, the result is a pointer that catalyst and the choice of a suitable reaction condition has the potential to influence the rate of hydrolysis in oil.