ABSTRACT
Objective The volatile oil was further purified to get the patchouli alcohol by molecular distillation taking patchouli oil which contained 23.97% of patchouli alcohol as raw material.Methods The best process parameters,including temperature,feed rate,and scraping rate,of molecular distillation technique for separating patchouli oil were studied by orthogonal test.The content was detected by GC under the conditions of elastic quartz capillary column HP-5,detector temperature 280 ℃,gasification temperature 280 ℃,distributary refer 20∶1.The effects of evaporation temperature on content and extraction rate of the patchouli oil had been investigated and the difference between the molecular and vapor distillations was studied.Results Content and extraction rate of patchouli alcohol under the best evaporation temperature 65 ℃ by molecular distillation reached to 40.71% and 76.55%,respectively.Conclusion The molecular distillation technique that could get the product with higher purity and extracting rate than that by vapor distillation in patchouli oil purification has a very good prospect in industry.