Isolation and Characterization of Chitin and Chitosan from the Biomass of Nigerian Shrimp Shells and Conversion to Glucosamine

Abstract

The most important bio-polysaccharide for biochemical industries are chitin and chitosan. These chemical entities are nitrogenous polysaccharide polymers containing 2-acetamido-2-deoxyglucoside units. These products are useful in engineering, medicine, agriculture and other industrial uses. Glucosamine is a known drug for treating muscular skeletal problem and has been obtained from these two amino polysaccharides. The present study was aimed at isolation of chitin and chitosan from shrimp wastes by chemical methods involving, deproteinization, demineralization, depigmentation, filtration and deacetylation where necessary. These were simultaneously converted to glucosamine by acid hydrolysis using 37% HCl. The yield of chitin was 17% and deacetylation of chitin resulted in 56% chitosan. The proximate analysis of chitin isolated gave rise to the following result: moisture 2.9%, ash 4.54%, lipids 2.1% and protein 3.3%. These compounds were characterized using FTIR. In the infra-red spectrum, the shrimp chitin indicated amide (I) band at 1614cm^-1 whereas chitosan and glucosamine showed no amide band but hydroxyl and amino groups between the ranges of 3110-3595 cm^-1. The results of these analyses including the proximate analysis compared well with literature values. There is paucity of information in literature about this type of study in Nigeria. This study has created awareness that these biomaterials from crustacean sources from Nigeria are technologically useful for conversion into useful products that can be used in Engineering, Medicine, Agriculture and other industrial products. This work provides route of controlling pollution menaces caused in fishing and canning sites. This is a case of creating Wealth from Wastes.