Advances in supercritical carbon dioxide technologies

The high price of organic solvents, environmental factors and the requireme nts of, for instance, the medical and food industries for ultrapure product s have increased the need to develop new processing techniques. Since the e nd of the 1970s, supercritical fluid extraction has been used to isolate na tural products, but for a long time the applications concentrated on only f ew products. Now the development of processes and equipment that has lasted for over three decades is beginning to pay off and industries are getting more and more interested in supercritical techniques. This article summariz es some of the advances and the latest developments in the field of supercr itical fluid technology focusing on using supercritical carbon dioxide in f ood, nutraceutical and pharmaceutical applications and takes a quick outloo k for the future prospects. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reser ved.