Yes, but you must have domestic microwave with power control with timer

A lot of the early microwave experiments used kitchen microwaves. One does need to watch the pressure in the container with you extract if it is capped or sealed. Early microwaves tended to destroy the magnetron if there wasn't enough microwave absorbing material (food) in the oven- that's why instructions often mentioned placing a cup of water in the oven when warming just a small portion of food. Modern microwaves can modulate the output to avoid this problem, but the output level may not be what you set when programming the oven.

I think it is rather difficult to control the conditions in a household microwave. Hence reproducability is difficult. Moreover I wouldn't use seald vessels without a proper control of temperature and pressure (i think regular commercial lab µwaves withstand 20 bars). This of course raises the question if your reaction will then give better results without pressure and elevated temperatures compared to conventional heating.

A kitchen microwave can be used (with minimal mess) and especially the ones available today seem to have less inter-day variable output than units of times past. Care should be taken to ensure the compounds of interest don't degrade, so it will depend on your sample. As Jack was getting to, if you can buffer the variability/surges of the energy onto the sample by adding a beaker of a given volume of water which will absorb much of the energy, making sure your vessel is not sealed and perhaps using the 'defrost' function to spread out the energy put into the sample over time, you may be able to better control and predict the energy going into the sample. depending on what your objective is, it should be relatively easy to validate the energy output of your optimized method by e.g. measuring the temperature of the water in the beaker after successive tries as temperature will correlate to energy output which also correlates to extraction yield.

I appreciate your answers. I have seen an improvised set up with a hole through the top for a condenser. Google images has something like that for the "Microwave assisted extraction search phrase".

http://share.psu.ac.th/blog/sci-discus/17171

The problem is; it is in Thai!

Maybe suggest to try www.google.com/translate

@Blake Ebersole: I would like to use the set up for extraction of natural products from plants. So cutting a hole in the top of the microwave for a condenser is okay?

I tried google translate; it didnt work.

John - I don't see why this wouldn't work. Here is what Google translate gave me: "The day before the hearing KM Count radiation (not sure what the name is or is not fit to call if you have used this name instead of the first time that the president KM) with the knowledge of the danger. of radiation. I have to say. Of microwave radiation. It is not a gift. It helps with the heat from the microwave. I am reminded of the knowledge they have learned. It has come to explore and share as much as I like the microwave to heat it up. To the extraction well. I will recite to you by post.

Microwave technique extraction. (Microwave-assisted extraction, MAE).

MAE in the extraction efficiency and reduce the time to prepare for and reduce the volume of solvent used, compared with the traditional extraction techniques, by providing heat for MAE is based on the direct extraction of Microwave the molecule. Microwave energy causes molecular movement. By the Great Migration of ions and rotation of the pair of electrodes. By the rotation of a pair of electrodes as the electric field of the solvent molecules in the sample and in the sudden heat.

Analysis system.

Semi-closed system extracts essential for efficient extraction solvent due to the increased temperature. (Rules of the - Blue Wash, Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac) the efficiency of the mass transfer of water to the solvent used to extract better.

The extraction system with a low volatility, such as pesticides, PAHs cause the reflux to the efficiency of the extraction.

Factors to take into consideration.

Types of solvent: a solvent to extract the maximum value. Absorb microwave energy. With high specificity to the reaction forward. (A polar solvent such as MeOH, acetone ...).

Volume: the volume of solvent required and is sufficient.

Temperature: Temperature affects the acceleration of mass transfer. Moving the material better. Solvent viscosity can move less water.

Time: extraction affects the balance.

Interfering substances: substances interfere with the signal, the recovery of the method.

Advantages.

The advantage is that there is a reduction in the use of MAE in the extraction process using microwave extraction can be argued that the differences in the thermal characteristics of microwave and conventional extraction techniques. (As shown below) in the heat of the process of extraction is a limit to the time required for heat to pass through the container before passing into solution (heat transfer chain) to take. Over time, all the molecules of the solvent and the sample is heated as needed. However, this technique enables a microwave to heat the solvent molecules. Thus, all molecules to heat up and in the blink of an eye on the energy spectrum. Can see that the temperature is the heat change for a short period compared to conventional extraction methods.

The application.

This technique has been applied for the extraction of organic compounds in New Jersey, such as PAHs, pesticides, PCBs and phenol many kinds of solid and liquid samples such as soil, sediment, soil, plant parts, and water samples.

@Blake Ebersole : thanks for the translation, Sir. Guess I'll have to keep on looking. Cheers!

John, it has been mentioned before but as I used a kitchen MW in a chemistry lab years ago, I should just share one or 2 things. As you have NO control on internal temp./pressure, start “easy” and use a vessel bigger than usual so it can handle any “side reactions”. I was actually putting a vessel (small) within a bigger one. Other recommendation, I would stick the MW in a food hood and have the possibility to switch off the MW from the outside (all fume hood these days have switches on the outside).

I am not a MW rep. but two weeks ago I saw a demo on MW (digestion/chemistry), they are getting cheaper... and safe.... worth the look!

Thanks Laurent, I appreciate this!

Dear John,

I am doing extraction of active compounds from plants using domestic oven (household). You can find the procedure of MAE in this paper.

Chan, C.-H., Yusoff, R., & Ngoh, G.-C. (2013). Modeling and prediction of extraction profile for microwave-assisted extraction based on absorbed microwave energy. Food Chemistry, 140(1–2), 147-153. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.foodchem.2013.02.057

Dear Chung,

Thank you for this kind gesture. I however do not have access to the journal. I have sent my email to your inbox. Please could you send it as an attachment to me. Cheers!

Please, look:

A commercial microwave oven has been modified for laboratory applications, Pougnet, M.A.B. 1993, Review of Scientific Instruments 64 (2) , pp. 529-531.

Dear Chung,

How can we avoid the bursting of closed bottle during extraction? As the extraction starts, pressure develops and it will ultimately leads to bursting of bottle.

@Piyush Kashyap

I have followed Dr Chung's method for the past five years and accumulated severally publications on the procedure myself in the period. All I can say is that if you use a thick bottle (winchester type), if your oven is set at the defrost function, if you you DONT exceed the three minute irradiation time, if you allow for cooling (at least five minutes) between microwaving periods then you are good. I have had some accidents along the way but they are usually not serious; usually the solvents cool very rapidly on explosion and microwave oven doors come with some level of shock proofing.