It is clear that the current concern for safety in food products has increased interest in green and reliable extraction techniques, instead of the conventional organic solvent extraction processes.
Solubility and stability of lycopene are the main problems in
extracting lycopene from tomato by-products. Lycopene is insoluble
in water but soluble in highly toxic organic solvents such as benzene,
chloroform, and dichloromethane; it also decomposes easily during
storage. Development of the supercritical fluid extraction (SFE)
method is one way scientists have worked to circumvent these
problems.