Exploiting self-assembled soft systems based on surfactants, biopolymers and their mixtures for inhibition of Citral degradation under harsh acidic Conditions

The chemical instability of Citral in acidic conditions is viewed as hurdle to commercialize it in food/beverage industries. We attempted to stabilize citral in various single and mixed surfactant systems at pH 1.0 and temperature 25 degrees C. The study highlights the importance of amount and density of positive charge of cationic surfactants and oxyethylene content of nonionic surfactants at the interface of self-assembly in inhibiting citral degradation. The hybrid of Chitosan and P123 showed a significant increase in the half-life of citral compared to that in its individual components. The results of the study suggest that it is possible to stabilize citral in strong acidic environs having a pH as low as 1.0 using mixed surfactant or polymer-amphiphile systems with significant positive charge/number of oxyethylene in their single components. Such polymer-surfactant systems formulations if biocompatible/food grade may act as promising media to enhance shelf life of citral.