In this work, the pervaporation technique is investigated in the separation of dilute solutions of volatile compounds from brown crab effluent in order to obtain a valuable food flavoring fraction. A systematic study of the pervaporation process has been carried out on dilute model solutions of some of the compounds identified in the brown crab effluent as typical volatile compounds. The membrane used in this work was a hydrophobic membrane with a selective layer of POMS (polyoctylmethyl siloxane). The effect of some operating variables, such as feed flow rate, feed concentration, feed temperature and permeate pressure was analyzed on the pervaporation performance of the membrane. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.