A Review on Chitin and Chitosan Polymers: Structure, Chemistry, Solubility, Derivatives, and Applications

Abstract

Chitin and chitosan are considerably versatile and promising biomaterials. The deacetylated chitin derivative chitosan is a useful and interesting bioactive polymer. Despite its biodegradability, it has many reactive amino side groups, which offer possibilities of chemical modifications, formation of a large variety of beneficial derivatives, which are commercially available or can be made available via graft reactions and ionic interactions. This study looks at the contemporary research in chitin and chitosan towards structure, properties, and applications in various industrial and biomedical fields.

Complexation as an approach to entrap cationic drugs into cationic nanoparticles administered intranasally for Alzheimer's disease management: preparation and detection in rat brain

“…Chitosan itself is prepared by partial alkaline hydrolysis of the acetamide groups of chitin; a natural polysaccharide found mainly in the structure of the exoskeleton of crustaceans 7 . Chitosan is able to adhere to nasal mucosal surface for extended time due to its hydrophilic cationic amine groups that bind electrostatically to the negatively charged sialic acid moiety of the nasal mucosa 8 .…”

Chitosan-based nanoparticles for improved anticancer efficacy and bioavailability of mifepristone

“…Therefore, chitosan has been widely used as a biomaterial or adjuvant in disease therapy [12], tissue engineering, and drug delivery [13]. Owning to the reactive amino side groups, chitosan could be made available via chemical modifications or ionic interactions [14]. Chitosan-bearing protonated amino groups could interact with a wide variety of natural or synthetic anionic species, such as negatively charged proteins, DNA [15–19], and some synthetic basic polymers such as sodium tripolyphosphate (TPP) [20–21] to form ionic complexes.…”

Systems analysis of the glycoside hydrolase family 18 enzymes from Cellvibrio japonicus characterizes essential chitin degradation functions

“…Chitin deconstruction shares many features with cellulose degradation, which is not surprising given that chitin has a crystalline structure similar to that of cellulose and differs chemically via an N-acetyl substitution at the C2 carbon (12). Specifically, chitin depolymerization is achieved through a concerted effort of endo-and exo-acting enzymes to reduce polymer length to short oligosaccharides that are then converted to Nacetylglucosamine monomers by hexosaminidases for entry into cellular metabolism ( Fig.…”