Effect of variation in composition on water vapor resistance and solubility properties of chitosan based edible film

This study was undertaken to analyze the effect of variation in composition on water vapor resistance and solubility properties of chitosan based edible film. The experiments were carried out in Central Composite Rotatable Design (CCRD) and total 14 film solutions were formulated by varying chitosan and glycerol concentration from 0.5 to 3% (w/w) and 0 to 3% (w/w) respectively. Films were analyzed individually for water vapor transmission rate (WVTR) and percentage water solubility (PWS) after conditioning. In this study it was observed that changes in chitosan and glycerol concentration has significant effect on both the responses. It was revealed that film with lower concentration of chitosan (0.5%, w/w) and higher concentration of glycerol (1.5%, w/w) showed WVTR and PWS at the higher range (0.12 g/m2.24 hrs and 13.04% respectively). However, higher concentration of chitosan with minimum proportion of glycerol (2.63%, w/w and 0.44%, w/w respectively) demonstrated optimum value for both the responses (0.04 g/m2.24 hrs and 11.25% respectively) in Response Surface Method (RSM) of optimization. Comparison test further verified the adequacy of fitted model for prediction of optimized values.