With increasing concern about synthetic packaging, multifunctional edible films made from natural polymers could play a significant part as an alternative to them. Carrageenan a sea weed polysaccharide has film forming capacity, but the films have poor mechanical and barrier properties, and this is a limiting factor for its use as an edible packaging material. A carrageenan-graft composite film was obtained by grafting carrageenan with gallic acid through free radical grafting method consisting of hydrogen peroxide/ ascorbic acid redox pair and then compositing the grafted polymer with micro fibrillated cellulose. With increasing concentration of graft-carrageenan, an increase in brittleness of the films were obtained. When, micro fibrillated cellulose at a concentration of 0.5% was added in a ratio of 1:0.5 (carrageenan: micro-fibrillated cellulose) a translucent, flexible yet strong film was obtained. Thus, grafted carrageenan can be successfully composited with micro fibrillated cellulose to produce a multifunctional edible film.

Reinforcement of carrageenan graft gallic acid with micro-fibrillated cellulose

256th National Meeting (2018)

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