PROCESSAMENTO DO ÓLEO DE GIRASSOL COMO ESTRATÉGIA PARA A PRODUÇÃO DE COSMÉTICOS ORGÂNICOS

Organic cosmetic formulations must not contain synthetic or semisynthetic substances. Otherwise, they must have materials of organic origin in their composition, which may be manufactured according to strict rules of extraction, purification and processing. The modifications allowed for the production of organic raw materials include hydrolysis, esterification, transesterification, hydrogenation, and saponification reactions. The saponification process consists of oils and fats transformation into surfactant by a reaction of triglycerides, present in oils, with an alkali. The surfactants are applied in several products and can act as emulsifiers, detergents, foaming agents, conditioners, bactericides and solubilizers. One of the biggest challenges to the development of organic cosmetics is to replace synthetic surfactants by natural excipients that have the same functional properties as the first ones. Thus, the aim of this work was to obtain organic surfactants by the saponification of sunflower oil using an up-scalable method. Four different alkalis were used to carry out the saponification reaction (NaOH, KOH, TEA and AMP-95). The final products were evaluated according to organoleptic properties, free alkalinity index and foaming, emulsifying and detergent capacity, based on official methods previously described in the literature. It was observed that the characteristics, as well as the applicability of surfactants on the formulation of organic cosmetics may vary according to the alkali used in the saponification process. The surfactant obtained from KOH presented the higher number of applications in organic cosmetics, which may be used in the formulation of liquid and bar soaps and emulsifying systems.