It was a challenge to develop
a miniature alembic, suitable to provide a fast extraction of essential
oils from the fresh samples and to collect the extract by using
a Vigreux’s column as an air-cooled condenser, suitable also to be
placed inside the microwave oven. In this way,the PMAE apparatus
can provide information about the actual state of the fresh samples
and their essential oil content. This procedure is also appropriate for
teaching laboratory, does not require any special microwave equipment.
The experiment developed, additionally thanto provide a fast
information on real samples, allows the students to learn extraction,
chromatographic and spectroscopic analysis skills, and is a
dramatic visual example of rapid, sustainable and green extraction
of natural products, suitable to be introduced to commercially successful,
sustainable and green chemical processing with microwave
energy