Seaweed Polysaccharide Based Products and Materials: An Assessment on Their Production from a Sustainability Point of View

Abstract

Among the various natural polymers, polysaccharides are one of the oldest biopolymers present on the Earth. They play a very crucial role in the survival of both animals and plants. Due to the presence of hydroxyl functional groups in most of the polysaccharides, it is easy to prepare their chemical derivatives. Several polysaccharide derivatives are widely used in a number of industrial applications. The polysaccharides such as cellulose, starch, chitosan, etc., have several applications but due to some distinguished characteristic properties, seaweed polysaccharides are preferred in a number of applications. This review covers published literature on the seaweed polysaccharides, their origin, and extraction from seaweeds, application, and chemical modification. Derivatization of the polysaccharides to impart new functionalities by chemical modification such as esterification, amidation, amination, C-N bond formation, sulphation, acetylation, phosphorylation, and graft copolymerization is discussed. The suitability of extraction of seaweed polysaccharides such as agar, carrageenan, and alginate using ionic solvent systems from a sustainability point of view and future prospects for efficient extraction and functionalization of seaweed polysaccharides is also included in this review article.

Antioxidant and Teratogenic Activities of Formulated Agar Extracted from Brown Seaweed Turbinaria conoides against Zebrafish Larvae

“…Marine pharmacologist creates methods in the manufacturing business that maximize the yield and production rate of FA. They also want to cut waste and energy expenses at every step of the experiment [ 23 ]. The agar formulation methods and yield used for developing antioxidant properties for both the FAs from brown seaweed have been successful ( T. conoides ).…”

Molecular mechanisms of anti-cancer bioactivities of seaweed polysaccharides

“…Seaweed polysaccharide is one of the important active components of traditional Chinese medicine seaweed. The well-known fucoidan, agarose, carrageenan, alginic acid, ulvan and fucoidan all belong to seaweed polysaccharide ( Chudasama, Sequeira, Moradiya, & Prasad, 2021 ), as shown in Fig. 2 .…”

The Efficacy of Double-Heart Nursing in Combination with Seaweed Polysaccharide for Patients with Coronary Heart Disease Complicated with Diabetes: A Pilot, Randomized Clinical Trial

“…The experiments conducted by the Qingdao Ocean University demonstrated that LMSF can directly scavenge peroxyanion free radicals and hydroxyl free radicals in vitro and also significantly enhance the SOD binding capacity in serum and tissues in vivo . Accordingly, it can serve as a potential drug in lowering blood lipids and preventing atherosclerosis [ 8 , 9 ]. The present study was designed to explore the treatment effectiveness of double-heart nursing in combination with seaweed polysaccharide on coronary heart disease complicated with diabetes.…”