ICAR Research Data Repository for Knowledge Management

A new degumming protocol has been developed which employs electrolyte solutions to remove nonhydratable gums from soybean, rice bran and
mustard oils. It removes nonhydratable gums, mostly phosphatidic acid (PA)and phosphatidyl ethanolamine (PE), which is left out after water degumming,and could not be removed without the use of phosphoric or citric acid. Acid
degumming is associated with oil loss (~10%) due to the emulsifying nature and subsequent washings. However, physical degumming with electrolyte solutions, when combined with water degumming, removes nonhydratable
gums with much less oil loss (~4%). The water-degummed vegetable oils,when treated with 2% of electrolyte solution, prepared by mixing aqueous solution of 1.5% of potassium chloride and 0.5% of sodium chloride in a ratio
of 95 : 5 (v/v), yielded degummed soybean, rice-bran and mustard oils with phospholipid contents as low a 0.05, 0.06 and 0.02%, respectively. Gums recovered through this technique can easily be regenerated and used for
commercial purposes.