LS01 Laminaria Saccharina (Fucodian or Alginic Acid)
It is severely under-documented the process of extracting any polysaccharides from seaweeds. It is also extremely difficult to find any information on what polysaccharide you might be extracting. Furthermore, it is especially difficult to find any information on alginic acid and alginate extraction (and yes, they are different).
From my research, I have mainly guessed that the polysaccharide that can be derived from sugar kelp (Laminaria saccharina, aka kombu), is alginic acid. I got to this fact solely by knowing that alginate is made from brown seaweeds, so there is a possibility that it is a different polysaccharide. For example, a different polysaccharide that might be in the brown seaweed is fucodian.
If it is alginic acid, it needs to be converted to a salt to become an alginate like sodium alginate. Then, in the presence of calcium ions, sodium alginate can become a film. But, I don't have and knowledge or equipment to do that. So, I decided to just put some kombu in the blender for funsies.
Procedure:
Blend the seaweed in water (choose your own ratio, but I used150mL of water and 3g seaweed).
After five minutes or when once the mixture homogenous, put it into a pan.
Heat at 80C for 2-10 minutes, depending on quantity. You will lose some water in this step and the gel will become thicker, but this is intended.
Strain the mixture into two different containers. Try to seperate the "syrup" and the solids.
Heat the syrup up again for some time (5 minutes at 80C).
Cast into a mold (I also put the solids along with the bioplastic to see what would happen).
Let dry for 5 days
Done!
Before drying:
After drying:
Results:
Weak film
Translucent at best
Very flexible
Smelly
Overall, I would call this a bit of a failure. This is because it is a very weak film. That being said, I did make a film, so this process evidently could be modified to be better.
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