Determination of Optimum Conditions for Carotenoid Extraction from Tomatoes

Producing food colors from natural sources, such as tomatoes, which could be used instead of synthetic colors, is important in relation to health and safety aspects of the consumers. In this research, solvent extracting was carried out by using three non-polar solvents, including petrolium ether (bp=55°C), n-hexane (bp=60°C) and a mixture of n-hexane: ethanol: aceton (1:1:2, bp=50°C). Also, two different temperatures (room temperature and boiling point of the solvent) and three different periods of time (2,4 and 6 hours) of extraction were tried. Using mixture of the solvents (at boiling point) for six hours showed to be the optimum conditions for extraction and there were significant differences between this treatment and other conditions for extractions. In addition to the above results, the same volumes of the solvent and samples were found to be the best ratio in comparison with the other volumes ratios. It was significant at P .05.. The yield of color extraction from tomatoes and tomato powder was 0.14 and 0.24% (w/w), respectively. Also, the purity of the extracted color was 82.65% lycopen. The extracted color showed a good stability in sunflower oil for three months at 4°C.