Ndubuisi Philip EGBOLUCHE

Sodium alginate is a commonly used encapsulation matrix for variety of materials such as plant cells, food products, oil and flavor. This compound is biodegradable, biocompatible and non-toxic. Also, it is cheap, available, has chelating ability and forms stable reversible gels. However, plant extracts have challenges of poor utilization, poor stability, chemical degradation, low bioavailbility and high molecular weight. Therefore, this study was aimed at isolation, characterization and use of sodium alginate nanoparticles to encapsulate acetogenin compound isolated from Annona muricata leaf. Sodium alginate nanoparticles loaded with acetogenin compound were prepared and characterized using Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscope (FTIR). TEM revealed a spherical and irregular nature of sodium alginate nanoparticles loaded with acetogenin compound with particle size of 280nm. The encapsulation efficiency was 89% and this result shows that encapsulation in nanosized matrics with different concentrations of sodium alginate nanoparticles produced higher encapsulation efficiencies which therefore, enhances solubility, biovailability of acetogenin compound.