Solubility, Extraction, and Nanoparticles Production in Supercritical Carbon Dioxide: A Mini-Review

Abstract

Supercritical carbon dioxide (SC-CO2) is CO2 that is saved beyond the supercritical situations of 7.4 MPa and 31.1℃. Given the request for consumption of a green solvent for the environment, SC-CO2 is widely utilized in chemical, food and pharmaceutical industries (especially extraction). To design material and drug production processes using supercritical fluid (SCF) technology, knowledge of their solubility is important so that provides required information. Temperature and pressure are the main factors in the study of solubility. Solubility data are then evaluated using equation of state (EoSs), semi-empirical and intelligence models to establish suitable correlations. SC-CO2 is one of the most important materials used in SCFs to study solubility. Another application of SC-CO_2 is in the field of material extraction to reduce the consumption of organic solvents. Nanoparticles production in drug industry is another advantage of SC-CO2. Various approaches have been used to improve the performance and overcome the solubility/dissolution of the drug, which particle size reduction is one of them. Micro and nanoparticles can be produced using SCF techniques. These methods are RESS, GAS, SAS, SEDS, ASES, SFEE, and PGSS processes. In this review, the applications of SC-CO2 in drug solubility, extraction of valuable materials (from lipids, bioactive compounds from various plants, precious metals), and nanoparticles production for pharmaceutical processes are reported and discussed. Finally, the main challenges are explained.