Extraction and Physicochemical Characterization of Sunflower Seed Oil

Abstract

Edible oil is most often plant based oil, edible oil may be liquid at room temperature. It is suitable for food and cooking use. Sunflower seed are used to make oil, meal and confectionary products. Sunflower is one of the four major sources of edible oil worldwide and in Nigeria. Its oil quality is relatively flexible and has been adapted for many specific uses, but extended use of sunflower oil for industrial applications are difficult or impossible to obtain because vegetable oils are less stable chemically. One limiting factor in industrial uses of vegetable oils is that all such oils are susceptible to becoming rancid. The commercial success of such industrial application depends on their physical and chemical parameters. The oil sample used for this work was extracted from the oil-type sunflower seeds by mechanical pressing method. The percentage yield of the oil was 41%. This Work examines some of its physicochemical parameters. The values obtained were 1.464 as refractive index (at 40°C), 324.00 ± 1.00°C as its flash point, 0.9157 ± 0.0002 of specific gravity, 0.36 ± 0.058mgKOH/g as acid value, 190.65 ± 1.41mgKOH/g as saponification value and 103.21 ± 1.47g/100g as iodine value. These parameters were analyzed using the standard procedure as described by Onwuka (2005). The result obtained indicates that the sunflower seed oil is better consumed as food rather than its uses as industrial product.