Solid-liquid microwave-assisted extraction of bioactive extract recovery from Hunteria umbellata seeds: Non-mechanistic modelling, bi-objective optimization, HPLC finger printing and scale-up techno-economics with sensitivity analysis

Previous investigations reported evaluation of biological, therapeutic and pharmacological activities of phenolic bioactive extract from Huntaria Umbellate Seed (HUS). However, process modelling and optimization, upscaling as well as techno-economic evaluation of Microwave-Assisted Extraction (MAE) of HUS are seldom documented in the literature. Therefore, this study presents black-box modelling, optimization and techno-economics of MAE of HUS. Box-Behken Design (BBD) of Response Surface Methodology (RSM) was applied for modelling and optimizing experimental MAE factors: microwave power (520 – 1040 W), extraction time (2- 10 min), solid-liquid ratio (0.4 – 1 g/100 ml); and the responses: Total Phenolic Content (TPC) and Process Yield (PY). Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) codes were programmed in Matlab 2019 for the phenolic extract recovery prediction. Process scale-up simulation and techno-economics were performed in ASPEN Batch Process Developer (ABPD) software. Coefficients of determination (R²) of 0.9349 (BBD-RSM), 0.9959 (ANFIS) and 0.9772 (BBD-RSM), 0.9971 (ANFIS) were obtained for TPC and yield respectively. The optimal yield (24.2625%) and TPC (7.89125 mg GAE/gdw) were obtained at extraction time (2 min) with microwave power (780 W) and solid-liquid ratio (0.4 g/ml). HUS extract HPLC result contains bentulinic acid, chlorogenic acid, caffeic acid, elliagic acid, rutin and Qucertin. Techno-economic results gave batch size, batch time, production rate, total capital investment, annual production cost and payback time of 5 kg, 137 mins, 0.0364 kg/min, USD80398, USD456000 and 2.29 years respectively. Therefore, preliminary bioactive extract production from HUS is techno-economically feasible.