HYDROTROPIC EXTRACTION OF THEOBROMINE FROM COCOA BEAN SHELL.

Cocoa bean shell (CBS) is a waste product from chocolate and cocoa
milling industries. CBS is high in nutritive value but it is of limited use
in animal feeds because of its toxic theobromine content. Though its
theobromine content limited the use of CBS, its amino acid profile of
CBS compares favourably with palm kernel cake suggesting that it
could be utilized as a medium protein source to substitute grain protein
in livestock diets. Theobromine is also possesed many farmacological
function such as anti cancer, diuretics, cardiac stimulants,
hypocholesterolemic, smooth-muscle relaxants, atshma and coronary
vasodilators. Considering that Indonesia is the third largest producer
of cocoa in the, the potential usage of both protein and theobromine
content of cocoa bean shell, thus it is neccesary to separate
theobromine from cocoa bean shell. A new developed separation
process is the extraction process using aqueous hydrotropes solution
for recovery of naturally occurring secondary metabolites. The
solubility of the secondary metabolites extracted are increased sharply
and easily recovered. Recently several researches demonstrated that
high solubilization capacity and selectivity in solubilization by
hydrotropy could be used for extraction of water insoluble bioactive
compound such as piperin, limonin, curcuminoids and forskolin. Based
on the promising result by hydrotropic extraction of natural product,
thus it is a promising method in administering theobromine from
cocoa bean shell.
Keywords: hydrotropic, extraction, theobromine, cocoa bean shell