Surfactant applications Food industry

Polysorbates are also commonly used as (O/W) emulsifiers in the food industry (salad dressing, ice cream), and in cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, detergents, and in a myriad of other industrial applications. Current Western Europe consumption of sorbitol for surfactants manufacture can be estimated at around 15,000 tons per year. 

The world-wide extensive use of surfactants in various areas of application (emulsifiers, detergents, cosmetics, industrial cleaners, textile and food industries. 

Meanwhile the properties of aqueous gelatin/lecithin mixtures have not been investigated and not described in literature. At the same time, combined application of these natural surfactants (of high- and low-molecular masses) seems rather perspective for creating new stable emulsion systems, in particular in the food industry. 

The understanding of the interfacial behavior of aqueous surfactant solutions is a major issue in surface science both from a theoretical and from a technological point of view. On the one hand, the interpretation of several colloid phenomena requires detailed knowledge of the adsorption layer of the system [1] on the other hand, the performance of many commercial products and industrial technologies (e.g. detergents, pharmaceutical applications, food and mineral processing, oil recovery) [2] is based on the adsorption of surfactant molecules. This explains the widespread interest in surfactant adsorption studies and the fact that this phenomenon is still the subject of intensive experimental and theoretical investigation [3]. 

Chapters 12 to 15 deal with some specific applications of surfactants in the following industries personal care and cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals and the food industry. These chapters have been written to illustrate the applications of surfactants, but in some cases the basic phenomena involved are briefly described with reference to the more fundamental chapters. This applied part of the book demonstrates that an understanding of the basic principles should enable the formulation scientist to arrive at the optimum composition using a rational approach. It should also accelerate the development of the formulation and in some cases enable a prediction of the long-term physical stability. 

The final part deals with applications in the food industry. Food colloids are complex multiphase systems that are mostly stabilized by naturally occurring surfactants such as lipids or proteins. Some synthetic surfactants such as sorbitan esters and their ethoxylates as well as sucrose esters are used in food emulsions. The particles or droplets in food colloids may remain as individual units suspended in the medium, but in most cases aggregation of these particles or droplets takes place forming three-dimensional structures, referred to as gels . These aggregation structures are determined by the interaction forces between the particles or droplets that are controlled by the relative magnitudes of attractive (van der Waals forces) and repulsive forces. The... 

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