Structure elucidation and biological effects of carrageenans from red algae

Abstract

Marine polysaccharides from algae have wide applications in food, cosmetic, and pharmaceutical industry, due to their excellent thickening, stabilizing, and gel-forming property (Imeson 2000; van de Velde and De Ruiter 2002). Besides the applications in traditional industry, marine polysaccharides have a great potential to become a major resource of biomass for producing biofuel (Bringezu et al. 2009; Huesemann et al. 2010).