Kinetics of ultrasound-assisted lipase-catalyzed glycerolysis of olive oil in solvent-free system.

This work reports experimental kinetic data of solvent-free glycerolysis of olive oil using a commercial immobilized lipase (Novozym 435) under the influence of ultrasound irradiation. The experiments were performed in a mechanically stirred reactor under ultrasound irradiation, evaluating the effects of temperature (50-70 °C), enzyme concentration (2.5-10 wt%) and glycerol to oil molar ratio (0.8:1-3:1). Results show that ultrasound-assisted lipase-catalyzed glycerolysis might be a potential alternative route to conventional methods, as high contents of reaction products, especially monoglycerides, were achieved at mild irradiation power supply (~130 W) and temperature, in a relatively short reaction time (2h) and low enzyme content (7.5 wt%). To completeness, two simplified kinetic modeling approaches, based on the ordered-sequential bi bi mechanism and reaction stoichiometry, were employed to represent the experimental data, thus allowing a better understanding of the reaction kinetics.