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Physicochemical and biological properties of chitosan derivatives with varying molecular weight produced by chemical depolymerization

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Abstract

Chitosan derivatives with lower Mw were prepared by chemical depolymerization using hydrochloric acid. This modification improves functional and biological properties of shrimp chitosan and facilitates its utilizations. The obtained chitosan depolymerization products (CDP) were characterized in terms of molecular weight (Mw), degrees of acetylation (DA) and polymerization (DP), solubility, viscosity, crystallinity, and FTIR spectroscopy. High Mw-CDP (from 94.10 to 396.46 kDa) and low Mw-CDP (< 4.4 kDa), with a DP up to 7, were withdrawn at different hydrolysis times. It is clearly demonstrated that the viscosity, the DA, and the crystallinity decreased upon depolymerization, especially in low Mw-CDP, while solubility in water and acetic acid was highly improved. FTIR analysis showed similar spectra of chitosan and CDP. The antibacterial, antifungal, and antioxidant properties of CDP were investigated and demonstrated that they were related to its Mw. Indeed, as compared to chitosan, high Mw derivatives, especially C120, possess higher antibacterial and antifungal potentials. While, low Mw-CDP, especially H120, exhibited the highest antioxidant properties. Interestingly, the used chemical depolymerization process seems to be an efficient, simple, and easy method to produce bioactive chitosan derivatives with attractive characteristics to be applied in an industrial scale, especially as functional-food components.

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Funding

This work was funded by the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research, Tunisia. The financial support for this study is provided by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness [Grants MAT2015-65184-C2-1-R].

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Enzyme Engineering and Microbiology, National School of Engineering of Sfax (ENIS), University of Sfax, P.O. Box 1173, 3038, Sfax, Tunisia

    Sawsan Affes, Moncef Nasri & Hana Maalej

  2. Department of Chemistry in Pharmaceutical Science, Faculty of Pharmacy, Pluridisciplinar Institute, Complutense University of Madrid, 28040, Madrid, Spain

    Inmaculada Aranaz, Niuris Acosta & Ángeles Heras

  3. Department of Life Sciences, Faculty of Science of Gabes, Omar Ibn Khattab Street, 6029, Gabes, Tunisia

    Hana Maalej

Authors
  1. Sawsan Affes
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  2. Inmaculada Aranaz
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  3. Niuris Acosta
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  4. Ángeles Heras
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  5. Moncef Nasri
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Contributions

Sawsan Affes: conceptualization, methodology, validation, formal analysis, investigation, writing-original draft. Inmaculada Aranaz: conceptualization, resources, writing-review and editing, investigation. Niuris Acosta: resources, visualization, writing-review and editing. Angeles Heras: resources, visualization, writing-review and editing. Moncef Nasri: supervision, resources, visualization, writing-review and editing. Hana Maalej: supervision, conceptualization, resources, writing-review and editing. All authors read and approved the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Sawsan Affes.

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Highlights

• Chitosans with varying molecular weight were prepared by chemical depolymerization.

• Physiochemical characteristics of chitosan derivatives were determined.

• Antimicrobial and antioxidant potentials of chitosan derivatives were evaluated.

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Affes, S., Aranaz, I., Acosta, N. et al. Physicochemical and biological properties of chitosan derivatives with varying molecular weight produced by chemical depolymerization. Biomass Conv. Bioref. 14, 4111–4121 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13399-022-02662-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13399-022-02662-3

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