A week in the life of Arturo Castroorganic chemistry

Phytosolutions: Our mission is to provide 100% Natural, Safe, Non-toxic Cosmetics & Toiletries for topical ailments while uti-lizing holistic medicinal plant derivatives.

Phytosolutions specializes in steam distillation for the collection of essential oils; while, practicing various extraction techniques such as Acid-Base extractions for the isolation, purification, and the re-crystalization of phyto-chemical compounds. We also ensure proper solvent recovery in order to minimize our Carbon footprint.Our purpose as a laboratory based company in Research & Development is to make significant scientific contributioins in the fields of:

Skin/Hair Care Oral Hygiene Culinary Extracts Hydro/Aero Ponics Water Purification

All Plant matter is collected and harvested from their natural environments and utilized in each extraction processes. The Concentrate containing holistic properties is then used to infuse various products in the manufacture of: hand made Soap, Lotion, Cold-Cream, Lip Balm, Body Butter/Scrub, Oral Rinse, and an Aloe Sun Screen.

Arturo Castro :“My interest in Chemistry began back in high school when I participated in a chemistry demonstration exhibit to the Ele-mentry & Middle school campuses. The program was designed to spark interest and curiosity in the Natural Sciences for young minds. I participated in the program for 3yrs; helping design the demonstrations, to planning the event and even Directing my final year.While in High School, my collegiate career began at Texas State Technical college & The Univerisity of Texas at Brownsville where I was dual enrolled earning college credit. After I grad-uated, I was accepted to The University of Texas at Austin in the fall of 2002, where I enrolled in the College of Mechanical Engineering. Here I explored subjects like ThermoDynamics and overall Mechanics in design and engineering principles. In my 3rd year at UT, I switched majors and was accepted to the College of Natural Sciences where I studied Organic Chemistry. During this time a new-found interest in Holistic Medicinal plants began.PhytoSolutions was created four years ago with a passion for cooking. It all began with an idea to cook with essentail oils rather than the traditional method of adding the herb itself to add both flavor and essence. I began to use Steam disstilla-tion to collect essential oils from culinary herbs such as: mint, thyme, and basil. It has since evolved to manufacturing cos-metics and toiletries all based on plant oils such as: Coconut Oil, Shea/Coaco Butters, and Aloe Vera. The callenge is mixing oil-in-water or water-in-oil emulsions is stable homogenization. PhytoSolutions uses both High Shear mixing and High Pressure Homogenizaiton to acheive stable nano-emulsion and insolu-able solid suspension.”

Echinopsis Pachanoi pups

San Pedro Garden

EQUIPMENT

Preasure MeterOnce the plant matter is stripped of its volitale oils, it is then collected in a pressure vessel capable of holding upto 4,000 psi. the pressure is then manipulated with an ice bath to change the solvent back into a gaseous state. the solvent is then recycled leaving behind the essential oils an phyto chemical compounds.

Heat Matthe extraction machine uses a heating blanket to manipu-late the temperature inside the extraction cell containing plant matter. the increase in temperature directly af-fects the pressure inside the cell; thus, changing the sol-vent from a liquid to a gas.

Millipore Minitan: Multi-cassett Micro filtration system designed to filter medium at the micon level

Solvent Recovery: An external 12 liter tankis used to both inject the extraction machine with new solvent; as well as, recoverying the solvent once the plant matter is washed of it’s oils and phyto chemical compounds

316L Stainless Steel Quick Disconnect for safley recycling solvent for future extractions

Ashcroft Bi-metal Thermometer range 50-550 degrees Ferienhiet Monitoring temperature during solvent phase change is neces-sary to ensure proper sovent recovery

Calamus Root Extract

A

B

C

A - Acacia Berlandieri

B - San Pedro: Echinopsis Pachanoi

C -Acacia Rigidula