Carrageenan

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Carrageenan

Carrageenan is made up of sodium, potassium, magnesium and calcium sulphate esters of galactose and 3, 6-anhydrogalactose units. It is a wholly natural ingredient

Description

Carrageenanis made up of sodium, potassium, magnesium and calcium sulphateesters of galactose and 3, 6-anhydrogalactose units. It is a whollynatural ingredient obtained from certain species of red edibleseaweed called the Class Rhodophyceae. The popular sources forCarrageenan are the ChondrusCripus, EucheumaCottonii andEucheumaSpinosum species.

TheChondruscrispus species grows mainly in cold water territories suchas the northern coasts of the Atlantic while the Eucheuma species areabundantly found in tropical climates like the Philippines. ThePhilippines has successfully launched and maintained numerousEucheumaCottonii and EucheumaSpinosum seaweed farms providing amplesupply and good quality to meet the growing demand.

There are threeCarrageenan types which are of commercial interest because of thevarious applications of hydrocolloids in food and other industrialuses. They are called the Iota, Kappa and Lambda Carrageenan. MarineHydrocolloids Carrageenan uses the EucheumaCottonii for theproduction of Kappa Carrageenan and the EucheumaSpinosum for IotaCarrageenan. ChondrusCrispus species is used for production of LambdaCarrageenan.