As a group of environmental-friendly chemicals, galactomannan gums acquired from plant resources demonstrates some distinguishing features such as convenient preparation processes, unique physical-chemical characteristics and bio-chemical properties. Moreover, these attributes can be further improved through modification of chemical and bio-chemical approaches. Therefore, they are found more and more applications in many major industries. This paper introduced the research development in the field of galactomannan gums, including their structure analysis and characterization, chemical and enzymatic modification, as well as applications in some industries.
Tara gum is a natural hydrocolloid obtained by a mechanical process from the endosperm of Tara tree seeds. In this study, chemical composition and structure of tara polysaccharide gum were characterized by fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) and gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer (GC-MS). Its rheological properties were also discussed. The results showed that tara gum had typical characteristics of plant polysaccharides, which was mainly consisted of galactose and mannose (mass ratio of galactose/mannose was 4.2:1), as well as a small amount of arabinose, glucose and xylose. The viscosity of tara gum solution was increased with the increase of its concentration. The tara gum solution demonstrated a higher viscocity at the shear rate lower than 80 Hz, but a higher elasticity at the shear rate higher than 80 Hz.
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