Moringa oleifera L. tree (Mo) has emerged as a rich alternative source of bioactive compounds
to design cosmetic formulations. Supercritical carbon dioxide fluid extraction (SFE-CO2) was successfully
applied on the screening of Mo seed, leaf, and root extracts. The extraction yield was evaluated
by response surface methodology (RSM), for pressure and temperature ranges of 117–273 bar and
41–60 C, respectively, using a design of experiments (DOE). The pressure significantly affected the
results (a = 0.05), with the highest extraction efficiency obtained at conditions above 195 bar. The
extracts’ composition, evaluated by gas chromatography-mass spectrometer (GC-MS), revealed an
increasing correlation between the pressure, total extract solubility, and mass of extract at a constant
temperature, due to the higher extraction yield. Seed extracts presented more than 80% of oleic acid in
relative composition (8.04 mgcompound gplantpart
-1). Leaf extracts performed well for the obtainment
of linolenic acid (>20%; 3.10 mg g-1), nonacosane (>22%; 0.46 mg g-1), and -tocopherol (>20%;
0.21 mg g-1). Mo root resulted in higher relative composition for sterol molecules, despite its very
low affinity with CO2. The most promising bioactive compounds, oleic acid and -tocopherol, were
more abundant when operating at 250 bar at 45 C and 195 bar at 55 C, for Mo seed and leaf SFE-CO2
extracts, respectively.
This work was financially supported by LA/P/0045/2020 (ALiCE), UIDB/50020/2020 and
UIDP/50020/2020 (LSRE-LCM), UIDB/00690/2020 and UIDP/00690/2020 (CIMO) and LA/P/0007/2021
(SusTEC), funded by national funds through the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia FCT/MCTES
(PIDDAC). Júlia Cristiê Kessler acknowledges her PhD scholarship (ref. 2020.06656.BD) from FCT.
