, and the others in South Asia. Cymbopogon exuosus and Cymbopogon citratus represent the two major species vastly cultivated for their essential oils in different regions of the world. C. citratus is known by numerous international common names, such as West Indian lemon grass or lemon grass (English), citronelle or verveine des indes (French), hierba limon or zacate de limón (Spanish), xiang mao (Chinese), capimcidrao or capim-santo (Portuguese), and locally there are identi ed more than 28 indigenous names from different countries of the world. The genus Cymbopogon has been reviewed comprehensively in several articles [Avoseh et al., 2015; Haque et al., 2018]. C. citratus is an aromatic, evergreen, clump-forming, perennial grass producing numerous stiff stems arising from a short rhizomatous rootstock, and growing around 1.5 m tall. It rarely produces owers. The leaves are blue-green in colour, at, erect, linear in shape and give off a characteristic lemon avour when they are crushed. C. citratus is considered to have its origin in Malaysia, nowadays it is widely cultivated in the Central and South America and parts of Africa, Southeast Asia, and the Indian Ocean Islands, both on a commercial scale and in gardens especially in the South

Every application of a substance results from the macroscopic property of the substance that is related to the substance’s microscopic structure. For example, the forged park gate in your city was produced thanks to the malleability and ductility of metals, which are related to the ability of shifting of layers of metal cations, while fire extinguishing powders use the high boiling point of compounds related to their regular ionic and covalent structures. This also applies to polymers. The purpose of this review is to summarise and present information on selected food-related biopolymers, with special attention on their respective structures, related properties, and resultant applications. Moreover, this paper also highlights how the treatment method used affects the structure, properties, and, hence, applications of some polysaccharides. Despite a strong focus on food-related biopolymers, this review is addressed to a broad community of both material engineers and food researchers.

The growing perspective of running out of crude oil followed by increasing prices for all crude oil-based materials, e.g., crude oil-based polymers, which have a huge number of practical applications but are usually neither biodegradable nor environmentally friendly, has resulted in searching for their substitutes—namely, bio-based polymers. Currently, both these types of polymers are used in practice worldwide. Owing to the advantages and disadvantages occurring among plastics with different origin, in this current review data on selected popular crude oil-based and bio-based polymers has been collected in order to compare their practical applications resulting from their composition, chemical structure, and related physical and chemical properties. The main goal is to compare polymers in pairs, which have the same or similar practical applications, regardless of different origin and composition. It has been proven that many crude oil-based polymers can be effectively replaced by bio-based polymers without significant loss of properties that ensure practical applications. Additionally, biopolymers have higher potential than crude oil-based polymers in many modern applications. It is concluded that the future of polymers will belong to bio-based rather than crude oil-based polymers.

Novel zero-trans frying shortenings were formed by enzymatic transesterification by exploring a palm stearin and canola oil mixture and stearic acid as substrates. Both immobilized (Novozym 435, Lipase PS “Amano” IM) and non-immobilized (Lipomod TM 34P) enzymes were applied as biocatalysts. Palmitic acid, the fatty acid which defines the proper type of crystal formation, was present at the 15% level in the reaction mixtures. The novel structured lipids had comparable physical properties and offered similar frying performance to those of commercial shortening. Needle-shaped crystals were predominant both in the transesterification products and the commercial frying shortening. Furthermore, solid fat content profiles of the zero-trans structured lipids produced by Novozym 435 and Lipase PS “Amano” IM were close to those of the commercial shortening.

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