Extraction of Minor Compounds (Chlorophylls and Carotenoids) from Yarrow–Rose Hip Mixtures by Traditional versus Green Technique

Abstract

© 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Nowadays, various branches from food industry generate large amount of by-products that are often underutilized, which could have negative environmental impact and increase the price of the raw material as it is not completely utilized in the production. Mixtures of two interesting plants (yarrow and rose hip) with different ratios, obtained as by-products from filter-tea factory, have been extracted with organic solvents and with environmentally friendly technology, supercritical fluid extraction (SFE). In the obtained extracts, quantitative content of minor plant pigments (chlorophylls and carotenoids) was determined and technologies were compared. Moreover, the effect of SFE parameters on yields of chlorophylls and carotenoids was determined. The results showed that SFE could be used as a good alternative for extraction of plant pigments from Achillea millefolium L. and Rosa canina L. mixtures. Besides plant pigments, the obtained extracts were rich in other nonpolar compounds from plant mixtures. Utilization of herbal waste provided value-added products, rich in various health benefit compounds. Practical Applications: Currently, there is growing interest for developing economically feasible and environmentally friendly processes for extraction of bioactive compounds from plant material. Moreover, sustainable and relatively cheap raw material should be utilized in the production. Therefore, waste and by-products from the food industry, e.g., plant material from filter-tea factory with small mean particle size, could be used. Traditional technologies used for extraction of chlorophylls and carotenoids are no longer environmentally acceptable and alternative green technologies, such as supercritical fluid extraction, should be considered. This research provides a comparison of green and traditional processes for plant pigment extraction and studies effects of process parameters (pressure and temperature) on yields of the investigated compounds. It also utilizes by-products of two medicinal plants (yarrow and rose hip) as raw material for extraction as herbal dust generated in filter-tea factory could not be used for tea bags filling.