Journals Proceedings

Abstract

Shell waste produced by the sea food industry is one of the most important problems contributing significant environmental and health hazards. The most frequent method employed for its disposal is burning which becomes environmentally costly due to low burning capacity of shells. In such a scenario, conversion of Shrimp shell waste to chitosan a commercially valuable product with a myriad of uses, could serve as an effective mode of shell remediation. Chitosan was obtained from shrimp shell waste by deproteination, demineralisation, decolourization and deacetylation processes. It was characterized using FT-IR, SEM and XRD. The physiochemical parameters like moisture content, pH, viscosity, residue on ignition, degree of deacetylation and solubility was also analysed. Results: Crude chitin was collected from shell of Penaeus monodon which was then processed to obtain chitosan. The chitosan yield was found to be 46%. Chitosan obtained had 5% moisture content, pH of 8 and 85% degree of deacetylation. Viscosity was 80cps. Residue on ignition was only 2% and was soluble in 1% acetic acid solution. The FT-IR, SEM and XRD data confirms the structure of chitosan. Conclusion: Biopolymers like chitin and chitosan are important due to their biological and physiochemical properties. These properties offer many potential applications in various fields like environmental protection, agriculture, medicine, pharamaceutics and biotechnology. The current study demonstrated an effective method for extraction of high purity chitosan from shrimp waste.