Canola sediment was obtained from an industrial filter cake by solvent
extraction. When heated in the differential scanning calorimeter (DSC
) (5-100-degrees-C), the sediment exhibited a single narrow melting pe
ak at around 74.8-degrees-C. No solid-state polymorphic transformation
of the material could be detected over this temperature range. The X-
ray powder diffraction pattern of canola sediment resembled waxes from
other sources with an orthorhombic unit cell. The phase transition be
havior of canola sediment in oil was studied by both DSC and polarizin
g microscopy. With increasing ratio of oil/sediment, a reduction in bo
th melting temperature and transition enthalpy was observed. The shape
of the supercooling curve resembled that of the melting curve. The in
duction time was determined by spectrophotometry and was used to calcu
late the interfacial free energy sigma between sediment and oil; sigma
= 4.71 erg/cm2. The effect of temperature and sediment concentration
on the clouding time of canola oil was studied; the clouding time was
the shortest at 5-degrees-C.