Influence of spray drying parameters on the physicochemical characteristics of microencapsulated orange (Citrus sinensis L.) essential oil

The study evaluated the factors affecting the microencapsulation of Citrus sinensis L. essential oil (CSEO) by spray drying method with maltodextrin as raw material. These investigated parameters including concentration of maltodextrin (20–35% w/w), concentration of CSEO (1.0–2.5% w/w), inlet temperature (120–180 °C) and feed flow rate (120–240 mL/h) were thoroughly analyzed. As the result, the spray drying parameters such as wall material concentration (30% w/w), core material concentration (1.5% w/w), inlet temperature (140 °C), and feed flow rate (120 mL/h) were identified to be effective parameters process on various indexes of microparticles for indexes of microparticles. This suitable condition gave the spray-dried powder with low moisture content (3.01%), high drying yield 90.05%, high values of MEE (89.94%), high MEY (76.09%) index, and low SO content (10.06%). After microencapsulation, the chemical compositions of essential oil were still maintained without any significant compromise in product qualities.