New Elaborated Technique for Isolation and Purification of Limonene from Orange Oil

Essential oil of the orange peel which was extracted by hydrodistillation methodshowed 50 different mono- and sesquiterpenes on gc-ms analysis, in whichlimonene had the highest percentage (92.4%). due to various important uses of thecompound, a method was developed for isolation and purification of limonene. inthis method, for extra purification, a fractional distillation on vigreux columnunder 100 mm hg vacuum was used which resulted in 96.7% purity for limonene.subsequent chromatography by two different packages of silica gel and activecharcoal columns resulted in 99.4% and 99.9 % purity of limonene, respectively.