Title: Encapsulation of essential oils into degradable microcapsules for controlled release

Biography:

Abstract

Many essential oils (EO’s) possess a wide spectrum of biological activity including anti-microbial, fungicidal, insecticidal/insect repellent, herbicidal, acaricidal and nematicidal properties. They provide a simple, inexpensive, and environmentally-friendly pest control. However, the volatility and water-insolubility of EO’s render their utilization as pesticide less appealing. To resolve these issues, EO’s were encapsulated into tiny shells (i.e., microparticles).

For the encapsulation of EO’s into microparticles, EO droplets were generated in the ethanol-water mixture through phase-separation. Subsequently, these tiny droplets were surrounded by protein molecules to prevent them from coalescing. Depending on the characteristics of employed proteins, the prepared microparticles showed different stabilities. For further stabilization of microparticles, the prepared microparticles were additionally coated with degradable synthetic polymer. The characteristics, encapsulation efficiency, and effective time of final products will be discussed.