Study on preparation and antifungal stability of microencapsulated cinnamaldehyde

• 1、School of Food Science and Technology, Jiangnan University, Wuxi 214122

Abstract：With the continuous improvement of people\'s living standards and safety awareness, it has become a trend for people to seek safe, efficient and green natural preservatives. Cinnamaldehyde is the active ingredient of cinnamon essential oil. As an antifungal agent, it can meet the requirements of food safety. However, cinnamaldehyde is volatile and unstable, resulting in poor long-term antifungal effect, which limits its application. Microcapsule technology can protect cinnamaldehyde and prolong its antifungal effect. In this paper, Aspergillus brasiliensis was used as a test strain, and cinnamaldehyde microcapsules were prepared by a composite coacervation method to study the effects of wall material composition, core-to-wall ratio, and crosslinking agent on microencapsulation efficiency and antifungal activity. The best preparation process of cinnamaldehyde microcapsules was determined by using Gelatin / Arabic gum as the wall material, core-to-wall ratio of 2: 1, tannic acid as the cross-linking agent, and the amount of tannic acid added was 0.3%. The encapsulation efficiency of cinnamaldehyde was 92.53 ± 5.20%, and the inhibitory zone diameter was 37.82 ± 0.63 mm. The microencapsulation efficiency of cinnamaldehyde is high and the antifungal effect is good. During accelerated storage, microcapsules can effectively protect cinnamaldehyde, delay the decrease of retention rate and improve the cinnamaldehyde bacteriostatic stability. By measuring the antifungal mechanism, it can be known that both non-microencapsulated and microencapsulated cinnamaldehyde inhibit the growth of fungi by destroying the mycelial cell membrane and causing intracellular protein leakage.

Keywords： Microcapsule Cinnamaldehyde Antifungal activity Microencapsulation efficiency