Tailoring Chitosan as a Pickering Emulsion Stabilizer – A Preliminary Assessment

Abstract

Emulsion based systems are gaining widespread popularity because of their promising ability to function as delivery systems for biologically active molecules and hence is being used in various sectors such as nutraceutical, pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries (Zhu et al., 2019; Boonlao et al., 2022). However, these are thermodynamically unstable systems owing to various destabilization mechanisms such as Ostwald ripening, flocculation, sedimentation, coalescence etc. (Xu et al., 2022). Therefore, an important pre-requisite in designing emulsion-based delivery system is the judicious selection of emulsifiers. The most commonly used emulsifiers are tween, span or other biopolymers. In recent times, there is an increasing trend to use solid particles instead of the conventional emulsifiers/ surfactants for fabricating stable emulsion delivery systems. Emulsions stabilized by solid particles are referred as pickering emulsions, which is pioneered by S.U. Pickering. This process has received tremendous acceptance globally owing to its surfactant free nature, resistance to coalescence and safety aspects. In addition, in a recently published report, it was highlighted that pickering emulsions can be used for production of powders with high oil content and superior controlled release attributes (Li et al., 2022).