Isolation and characterization of industrially relevant microbial polysaccharides

Objectives: To isolate polysaccharides which are secreted during the fermentation of marine microorganisms; to characterise the secreted polysaccharides and to determine their physical and chemical properties.

Background: Microbial polysaccharides are novel materials and their solutions have desirable rheological properties which are attractive to manufactures of household and personal care products. Many microbial polysaccharides have excellent surface properties and the fact that microbial sources can generate these materials, often using waste materials as carbon-feeds, makes them a potential source of sustainable surface active agents which can replace petroleum based products. There is a growing societal demand for natural personal care products and the controlled microbial production of polysaccharides has the capacity to meet this demand. A number of authors have reported the isolation of marine micro-organisms that produce polysaccharides, however, the structures and properties of these materials are not known.