With the toxicity problems arising from the consumption of hydrogen cyanide (HCN), an acceptable method of processing edible leaves with low HCN level while maintaining maximum nutritional content remain a challenge. This data focuses on the extraction kinetics of cyanide in cassava leaves during the soaking process. Various process parameters conducted at 26 ± 2 °C were evaluated, such as contact times (1-20 h) between the leaves and solvent, as well as the water-to-leaves ratios (spanning a range of 10-50 mL/g). After ten h of extraction with water, all experiments resulted in less than 9.5 ppm of HCN, which is less than the toxicity level recommended by the World Health Organization (10 ppm). The mild approach resulted in protein loss from 36.01% to 23.10-25.38%. Water-to-leaves ratios of 10, 30 and 50 mL/g resulted in a calculated effective cyanide diffusion coefficient of 0.864 × 10-13, 1.39 × 10-13, and 1.61 × 10-13 m2/s. The experimental data were also analyzed using empirical mathematical models to depict the leaching process. Accordingly, the data was predominantly fitted by Diffusion approach and Verma models with coefficients of determination (R2) of 0.999.
Keywords: Cassava leaves; Cyanide; Detoxification; Diffusivity; Modeling; Protein content.