Enzyme-catalyzed production of biodiesel by ultrasound-assisted ethanolysis of soybean oil in solvent-free system.

This work reports the transesterification of soybean oil with ethanol using a commercial immobilized lipase, Novozym 435, under the influence of ultrasound irradiation, in a solvent-free s. The experiments were performed in an ultrasonic water bath, following a sequence of experimental designs to evaluate the effects of temperature, enzyme and water concentrations, oil to ethanol molar ratio and output irradiation power on the reaction yield. Besides, a kinetic study varying the substrates molar ratio and enzyme concentration was also carried out. Results show that ultrasound-assisted lipase-catalyzed transesterification of soybean oil with ethanol in solvent-free system might be a potential alternative route to conventional alkali-catalyzed and/or traditional enzymatic methods, as high reaction yields (~78 wt%) were obtained at mild irradiation power supply (~132 W), and temperature (63 °C) in a relatively short reaction time, 1 h. Additionally, a study regarding the enzyme reuse was carried out at the experimental condition that afforded the best reaction yield.

Ultrasound-assisted lipase-catalyzed transesterification of soybean oil in organic solvent system.

This work reports the transesterification of soybean oil with ethanol using two commercial immobilized lipases under the influence of ultrasound irradiation. The experiments were performed in an ultrasonic water bath, following a sequence of experimental designs to assess the effects of temperature, enzyme and water concentrations, oil to ethanol molar ratio and output irradiation power on the reaction yield. Results show that ultrasound-assisted lipase-catalyzed transesterification of soybean oil with ethanol might be a potential alternative route to conventional alkali-catalyzed method, as high reaction yields (~90 wt.%) were obtained at mild irradiation power supply (~100 W), and temperature (60 °C) in a relatively short reaction time, 4h, using Lipozyme RM IM as catalyst. The repeated use of the catalyst under the optimum experimental condition resulted in a decay in both enzyme activity and product conversion after two cycles. The use of Novozym 435 led to lower conversions (about 57%) but the enzyme activity was stable after eight cycles of use, showing, however, a reduction in product conversion after the forth cycle.