ABSTRACT
Gum arabic or gum Acacia is the oldest and best known of the natural gums and its use goes back about 5,000 years to the time of the ancient Egyptians. Gum arabic is unique among the natural hydrocolloids because of its extremely high solubility in water. Gum arabic solutions are also affected by ultrasonic and radiation exposure. Ultrasonic treatment3738 of gum arabic solutions causes depolymerization of the gum arabic polymers resulting in a loss of viscosity. Gum arabic is a very effective emulsifying agent because of its protective colloid functionality and has found widespread use in the preparation of varied oil-in-water food emulsions. Probably the important application of gum arabic in food applications is in the preparation of spray-dried “encapsulated” or “fixed” flavors. The caloric availability of gum arabic is unclear but it is believed that gum arabic has a low level of digestibility and it has therefore found some use as a bulking agent in reduced calorie food applications.
