Ultrasonic-assisted emulsion stabilized by quaternized chitosan-carboxymethyl cellulose complex particles and its...

Fortifying food products with bioactive compounds is an essential step towards producing better and healthier functional foods. However, bioactive compounds are vulnerable to environmental conditions such as heat, light, and oxygen, rendering the fortification of food challenging. In this study, we aimed to prepare a novel polysaccharide-complexed emulsion system as the carrier for α-tocopherol. The results demonstrate that emulsifiers from complexes of carboxymethyl cellulose and quaternized chitosan effectively stabilized oil-in-water emulsions The emulsifying agent secured the droplets in a protected, interconnected layer of the emulsifier, rather than simply increasing the viscosity of the solution and preventing coalescence. This indicates that the stabilization mechanism is similar to that of a surfactant, which was confirmed by the absence of an upper free oil layer. Moreover, the ultrasonic emulsification demonstrated that increasing the sonication time from 7 to 11 min significantly decreased the droplet size and lowered the emulsion turbidity (p < 0.05), due to the break down of the droplets into finer emulsions. Nevertheless, the results demonstrated a significant improvement in emulsion stability (p < 0.05), as indicated by the lower creaming index with increasing sonication time and ultrasonic amplitude.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13197-025-06262-7.