Unleashing the power of hydrous 2-methyl tetrahydrofuran for enhanced oil extraction from rice bran and soybean flakes

Promoting renewable solvents can play a ubiquitous role in sustainable development goals. The investigation delved into the influence of temperature, solvent-to-solid mass ratio, and solvent water content on the yield of rice bran and soybean oil extraction using 2-MeTHF. The JCOSMO software delineated the charge density of solvent and solute molecules. The rice bran oil extracted exhibited a higher free fatty acid content at 26.54 wt%, contrasting with 0.93 wt% for soybean oil. FT-IR analysis was conducted to identify the main functional groups present in the biomasses and oils. The broad and asymmetric XRD peak at 20° decreased in intensity for soybean and remained unchanged for rice bran. Response surface methodology underscored temperature as the most critical variable in oil extraction from both materials, with the solvent-to-solid mass ratio showing no significant impact. Enhanced water content in the solvent proved beneficial for oil extraction from both biomasses. Notably, 2-MeTHF demonstrated higher yields than n-hexane, reaching maximum yields of 20.24 ± 0.64 g/100 g for rice bran and 22.66 ± 0.34 g/100 g for soybean flakes. This study emphasizes critical parameters for achieving higher oil extraction efficiency, highlighting the superior performance of 2-MeTHF over n-hexane. The findings can potentially optimize the extraction process for rice bran and soybean flakes, providing significant benefits for industries reliant on oil. The kinetic investigations substantiated enhanced extraction yields when employing the hydrated solvent; nonetheless, these studies also revealed heightened challenges in attaining equilibrium.