Alginate Characterization

Algae are plant-like organisms that are usually anchored on hard bases in coastal areas. They are producers of oxygen, the food base for most aquatic organisms, and the primary source of human crude oil, food, and many medicinal and industrial products. Currently, natural macroalgae-derived polysaccharides have received more attention due to their unique properties, such as stability, biodegradability, and biocompatibility. Alginate is a natural polymer composed of linear copolymers of β-(1-4)-linked d-mannuronic acid and β-(1-4)-linked l-guluronic acid units. It is widely found in brown algae, such as cystobacter, sclerophyte, seaweed, kelp, lessonia, macrocystis, sargassum and turbinate. Alginate occurs naturally in brown seaweed cell walls. These natural polysaccharides are widely used in various industries such as textile, agri-food, paper, cosmetic, biomedical, and pharmaceutical due to their rheological properties, such as gelation, viscosity enhancement, and dispersion stability. At CD BioSciences, the alginates are purified by reprecipitation with ethanol and characterized by ¹H-NMR, fluorescence spectroscopy, and infrared spectroscopy to determine their structure and physicochemical properties.

Fig. 1 Alginate and alginate composites for biomedical applications. (Raus R A, et al., 2021)

Our Services

Alginates are salts of the long-chain carbohydrate biopolymer alginic acid. Alginates have different viscosities and reactivity characteristics depending on the specific algal source and ions in the solution. CD BioSciences is committed to providing hands-on experience and an in-depth understanding of alginate industry property analysis.

• Biopolymer characterization
• Carbon nanofibers characterization
• Immersion experiments
• Viscoelastic characterization
• Tensile and compression testing
• Transparency
• Molecular weight determination
• The parameters of water content, ash determination
• Content, viscosity, and pH which aimed to determine the quality of alginate
• Microbiology testing
• Rheological measurement
• In vitro release studies
• Kinetic studies
• Statistical analysis

Our Technologies in Alginate Characterization Services

• UV–visible analysis
  UV–visible spectrogram of alginate extracts is used to detect carboxylate and protein components in alginate extracts.
• Proton nuclear magnetic resonance (¹H-NMR) analysis
  NMR spectroscopy is an important physicochemical method for elucidating the structure of polysaccharides. Structural features of alginate are elucidated by HNMR spectroscopy and revealed purity.
• FTIR spectrum
  Alginate FTIR curves are used to reveal different chemical functional groups of alginates.
• X-ray diffraction (XRD)
  XRD are used to study the microstructural features of alginates.
• Scanning electron microscopy (SEM)
  Scanning of alginate as a smart matrix for a riboflavin delivery system using SEM.
• Fluorescence spectroscopy
  The main alginate contaminants are polyphenols, endotoxins, and proteins. The degree of purification of alginate is detected by fluorescence spectroscopy.

CD BioSciences is a professional service provider for the marine biology industry. Our alginate characterization services can ensure that the most suitable methods and techniques are selected for your project. We provide our customers with the most precise ingredient data and highly informed process expertise. Our team of biomass experts plays a key role in the formulation, optimization and commercial evaluation of biomass value-added processes in industry and academia. If necessary, please feel free to contact us.

Reference

• Raus R A, Nawawi W M F W, Nasaruddin R R. Alginate and alginate composites for biomedical applications[J]. Asian Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences, 2021, 16(3): 280-306.

Please kindly note that our services can only be used to support research purposes (Not for clinical use).