Sodium Alginate Extraction

A total of 30 g of seaweed Sargassum sp. washed and dried. The dried seaweed soaked in a solution of 0.4% formalin for 6 hours and 1% HCl solution for 1 hour and then washed with distilled water to pH neutral. Furthermore, seaweed cut added a solution of Na2CO32% with a ratio of 1:30 (w/v). Subsequently extracted by Microwave at power level 70 for 16 minutes and then filtered. The filtrate obtained, was added 10% HCl (until pH 2-3). Then do the bleaching with NaOCl diluted with water 1: 1 to white. Then converted to sodium alginate by adding 20 g of Na2CO3 and stirred in a mixer. The resulting solution is then etched with ethanol to form sodium alginate fibers. Then filtering and pasta produced technical soaked in ethanol and dried in the sun for 12 hours until the moisture content of 12%. Furthermore, ground to a flour obtained sodium alginate.

Power level optimization done on level 70, 80, 90 and 100. As time optimization of extraction is done at 15, 16, 17 and 18 minutes.

Characterization of Alginate
Characterization of sodium alginate was conducted to determine the physical and chemical properties of sodium alginate extraction results.

Analysis of Water Content
Analysis of water content is done by gravimetric methods AOAC (1990), by drying the sample at 105 oC alginate. The water content is determined based on the dry weight alginate that is a percentage of the dry weight of the initial weight.

Ash Content
Ash content analysis performed by gravimetric methods AOAC (1990), by burning the sample at 600 oC. Alginate ash content expressed as a percentage by weight of ash to the dry sample weight.

Analysis of Pb and Hg
Determination of Pb and Hg performed according to the method James (1995), using the tool Atomic Absorption Spectrometry (AAS).

The