SIZE-EXCLUSION CHROMATOGRAPHY WITH VISCOSITY DETECTION OF COMPLEX POLYSACCHARIDES - COMPONENT ANALYSIS

Complex polysaccharides obtained from plants and microbes are finding increased application in the food industry as additives to improve the functional properties of processed foods. High-performance size exclu sion chromatography (HPSEC) with concentration-viscosity detection, co upled with Gaussian curve fitting of concentration and viscosity chrom atograms, a method earlier developed to investigate the behavior of a variety of pectins in solution, has now been applied to tragacanthin, gum locust bean, (carboxymethyl)cellulose, sodium alginates, apple pec tin, and gum arabic. Weight-average intrinsic viscosities (i.v.) were determined directly from areas under the concentration and specific vi scosity curves. In addition, global and component radii of gyration (R (gw)) and molecular weights (MW(w)) were determined from both size and universal calibration of columns with pululans. Gaussian component i. v. and component R(gw) values of some polysaccharides, investigated in 0.05 M NaNO3 at 35-degrees-C, were found to be related by a character istic power law exponent. HPSEC with concentration and viscosity detec tion has gold potential for rapidly determining physical properties cr ucial to control of quality of polysaccharides in the food industry.