Polysaccharides are natural polymers, or biopolymers with broad spectrum of applications due to their capability of modifying the solution properties by thickening, gelation, emulsification, stabilization, encapsulation, flocculation, swelling and gel formation.
They have many industrial applications, for example in food, chemical, pharmaceutical, cosmetic, textile, paint, oil industry, medicine and much more. For all of these applications, the key parameter to manipulate is the product structure which mainly influences the mechanical and rheological properties of the material, which consequently determine the functionality of products made of polysaccharides.
Conclusions
The frequency tests confirmed that gellan, welan and xanthan in water exhibit more pronounced elastic properties than HPMC and CMC. Such behavior is characteristic for weak gels. For CMC and HPMC solutions shear loss modulus G’’ prevails over shear storage modulus G' in the whole frequency range examined, which shows more pronounced viscous character of materials.
The analysis of rheological tests showed that the behavior of welan, xanthan, HPMC and CMC in water doesn’t change after aging, while the differences in behavior of gellan appear already after 20 days.
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