Experimental Proof of Concept Modelling and ASPEN Based Scale up Techno economics of Phenolic Nutraceutical Extract Production from South Western Polyherb

Abstract

“Gbogbonise” Polyherb (GP) is one of the traditional medicines used in Nigeria to cure various ailments as professed by Nigerian folks. However, no scientific work, including laboratory proof of concept experiment, has been documented in the literature regarding total phenolic content of extract recovery from GP. Therefore, this study reports High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) finger-profiling, process modelling, scale-up process simulation and manufacturing cost of phenolic extract production from GP. The poly-herbal extraction experiment and analyses were performed using Response Surface Methodology (RSM) at extraction time (2.79-4.21hours), extraction temperature (33.79-76.21°C), and solid-liquid ratio (0.007929-0.018355 g/ml) with yield, Total Phenolic Content (TPC), Total Flavonoid Content (TFC) and Antioxidant Activity (AA) as dependent variables. RSM models compared with the developed Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) models in Matlab software. ASPEN software was used for process simulation and cost of manufacturing. RSM and ANFIS models for predicting the extraction responses showed coefficients of determination (R2) of 0.99152 (RSM) and 0.999 (ANFIS) for yield, 0.981766 (RSM) and 0.9999 (ANFIS) for TFC, 0.986031 (RSM) and 0.999 (ANFIS) for AA, 0.842463 (RSM) and 0.999 (ANFIS) for TPC. HPLC results showed presence of betulinic acid (0.028 µg/g.dw), gallic acid (0.034 µg/g.dw), caffeic acid (0.051 µg/g.dw), erulic (0.0826 µg/g.dw) and ellagic acid (0.064 µg/g.dw) in the extract. The scale-up simulation results gave batch size (3.99 kg/batch) and number of batches (1,751 batches) for the annual production target (7,000 kg); while 339.1 USD/kg was obtained as product cost of manufacturing. The technical-economic-parameters obtained from this study are precursors to poly-herbal extraction plant design construction.