Case Study Rotavapor for nutraceuticals Customer: Italian phyto-pharmaceutical company

Case Study
Rotavapor ® for nutraceuticals
Customer: Italian phyto-pharmaceutical company
The Division of Pharmaceutical Biology at the University of Basel in Switzerland is a center of
excellence for natural product and medicinal plant research. It belongs to the Departement of
Pharmaceutical Sciences, a leading research and teaching center in drug discovery & development, drug therapy and drug safety.
Application: Elimination of ethanol from natural plant extracts
The hydro-alcoholic solution needs a distillation step, in which the entire alcoholic phase is
separated. This is necessary due to the following production steps, because the integrator is
used for human health.
Equipment: Rotavapor ® R-II V PLG + V-700 + B-741
The distillation system is complete with a vacuum pump, which is also used for vacuum filtrations in the same lab, and with a recirculating chiller, which avoids wasting water and improves
the efficiency of the condensing phase by also collecting some distilled ethanol, that can be
easily re-used. In order to avoid bumping, the customer also uses a manual pressure regulator
047291.
Benefit / Conclusion: Productivity!
Technical director is very happy to have a new BUCHI Rotavapor System, that’s quicker, safer
and very reliable than the old equipment. Peculiar comment about V-700: very efficient and
robust!
PH-001-12/11
The advantages of the distillation system are: speed, easy technology for scale up, safe operation with chiller, flexibility with a strong vacuum pump, ability to perform distillations up to 3 liters
per batch, recovery of the solvent.