ABSTRACT

Nowadays, biopolymers such as chitosan have attracted the attention of the scientific community as matrixes for the microencapsulation, immobilization, or controlled release of numerous active compounds and have been applied in the pharmaceutical, food, biomedical, chemical, and waste-treatment industries. On the other hand, microencapsulation has become a challenging approach to design new materials with biotechnological applications. This chapter shows the applicability of the microencapsulation of different systems with food, biomedical, and technological interest using chitosan. It focuses on this natural polymer, which shows intrinsic properties, such as biocompatibility, non-toxicity, and biodegradability. The chapter discusses the principles of microencapsulation, main microencapsulation techniques, design of microparticles prepared with different biopolymers, namely chitosan, importance and stability in the microencapsulation process. It also details the use of chitosan in microencapsulation processes.