Randomized trial explores chitosan characteristics in crab byproducts, indicating enhanced value and potential applications.
Key Points
This study aims to extract chitosan from blue crab shells and analyze its properties as well as the nanoparticles produced from it.
Chitosan was extracted from blue crab shells using a chemical extraction process combined with mechanical ball-milling.
Characterization techniques included dynamic light scattering (DLS), Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray Diffraction (XRD), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM).
Rheological properties were analyzed to assess differences in viscosity compared to commercial chitosan.
Crab chitosan nanoparticles had a minimum particle size of 192.74 ± 3.25 nm and a zeta potential of 25.15 ± 1.19 mV, outperforming commercial options measuring 245.47 ± 3.21 nm.
The extraction yielded 11.02% of chitosan based on the crab shell dry weight, indicating significant recovery.
The viscosity of crab chitosan (31.707 to 42.849 mPa·s) was notably higher than that of commercial chitosan (17.818 to 24.024 mPa·s), suggesting greater molecular weight.