Enzymatic-Assisted Extraction of polysaccharides from the brown algae Fucus vesiculosus
E-Mail: ana.malvis.romero@tuhh.de
The biological potential of brown algae is mainly due to their rich composition in polysaccharides such as alginates and fucoidans. However, we do not use them yet according to their numerous benefits and its potential in several applications such as cosmetic, food and pharmaceutical. Changing this is the main objective of this project.
The structure and chemical composition of algae polysaccharides is influenced by several factors such as the species, growth location, harvesting season, etc. In addition, other factors such as the extraction method and the experimental conditions can significantly affect the chemical structure and yield of the extracted polysaccharides, thus affecting their biological properties and applications.
By Enzymatic assisted extraction (EAE) of alginate and fucoidan, we will improve the extraction efficiency of these polysaccharides and optimize the Tª, pH, reaction time and enzyme to substrate ratio. Furthermore, the establishment of a suitable reactor set-up will be carried out to improve the effectiveness of the process.
During this master thesis:
• Identification of new enzymes and enzyme combinations for the extraction of alginate and fucoidan
• Optimization of the EAE reaction in terms of Tª, pH, reaction time and enzyme to substrate ratio
• Reactor design and set-up for the continuous hydrolysis of algae biomass at lab scale
• Downstream processing of the obtained hydrolysates for alginate and fucoidan extraction
• Optimization of the purification processes
• Alginate and fucoidan characterization with the established analytics
