Factors affecting microencapsulability in simple gelatin coacervation method

Abstract

Microencapsulation by way of simple coacervation by gelatin was examined. Five kinds of core material and six kinds of coacervation-inducing agent (CIA) were chosen and the encapsulability of each combination was studied. Some core materials are easily encapsulated, others are difficult to encapsulate, and some show a dependency of encapsulability on the CIA. Electrophoresis and gelatin adsorption studies revealed that encapsulation by way of simple coacervation by gelatin is caused by the affinity between core and coacervate resulting from gelatin adsorption on the core surface. These studies further revealed that cores onto which a large amount of gelatin has been adsorbed before coacervation can be encapsulated.