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Published on: April 9, 2016
Depletion-flocculation in oil-in-water emulsions using fibrillar protein assemblies
Theo B J Blijdenstein1, Cecile Veerman, Erik van der Linden
1Food Physics Laboratory, Department of Agrotechnology and Food Sciences, Wageningen University, PO Box 8129, 6700 EV, Wageningen, The Netherlands.
Abstract:
This paper shows that low concentrations of beta-lactoglobulin fibrils can induce depletion-flocculation in beta-lactoglobulin-stabilized oil-in-water emulsions. The minimum required fibril concentration for flocculation was determined experimentally for fibril lengths of about 3 and 0.1 microm. The minimum fibril concentration for flocculation is two orders of magnitude higher for the short fibrils than for the long ones. These experimental results correspond well with a theoretical prediction based on a model of spinodal decomposition. In addition, rheological measurements were performed, verifying that flocculation was induced by a depletion mechanism. The results of this study show that the minimum concentration required for depletion-flocculation can be tuned by varying the length of the fibrils.
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