The physicochemical and functional characteristics of the major coconut storage protein, 11S globulin or cocosin, were investigated. Cocosin was purified by a combination of salt extraction, selective precipitation, and gel filtration chromatography. The solubility of cocosin at different pH was higher at µ=0.5 than at µ=0.08. The 24 and 21 kDa basic polypeptides of cocosin were more resistant to chymotrypsin digestion than the 35 and 32 kDa acidic polypeptides. Cocosin emulsions were most stable at 0 M NaCl, followed by emulsions in 0.1 M and 0.4 M NaCl. The available SH groups were found to be 21.6 mole SH/mole cocosin. Cocosin was observed to be stable under various pasteurization conditions from 63℃, 30 min to 100℃, 10 sec. However, heating at 100℃ for 10 min and longer degraded cocosin up to 60%. The thermal denaturation midpoint temperature, T m , of the trimeric cocosin was 77.6℃ while that of the hexameric form was 100.5℃.