Recovery of aroma compounds from model solution using pervaporation membrane

Abstract

Pervaporation is able to extract water-solved organic compounds, among the aroma compounds. Using pervaporation it is not necessary to apply high temperature, so it can be used for heat-sensitive and as well as volatile material [Tan, Li, Xiao, Wu, & Zhang, 2005]. In food industry, the concentration of liquid food, fruit juices and drinks is made by evaporation. Using evaporation at lower temperature vacuum is applied and in this case the evaporation losses of aroma compounds are more considerable. Degradation of quantity of aroma compounds during food-processing leads to an unwished sensory decay. Vapours arise during evaporation and condensate contain significant amount of aroma compounds which can be recovered by vapour permeation or pervaporation for the most part if the condensate is led to the membrane. During the experiments we analyzed model solutions. Our primary objective was to define the quantities for the efficiency of the separation as permeation flux, activation energy and separation factor. The examined compounds were water, ethyl-acetate, i-butyl-alcohol. Regarded to the experiments we can say that permeation flux was the highest in case of ethyl-acetate and the smaller in case of water. Water had the highest activation energy; i- butyl-alcohol had the lowest. Separation factor of ethyl-acetate was 1.3-2.6 as much as i-butyl-alcohol's depending on temperature and concentration. Experimental data were compared to the results of mathematical models.