EVALUATION OF MARINE ALGAE KAPPAPHYCUS ALVAREZIL AS A SOURCE OF NATURAL PRESERVATIVE INGREDIENT

Marine organisms possess an inexhaustible source of useful chemical substances for the development of new drugs. The present project focused to identify the bioactive compounds from the seaweed Kappaphycus alvarezii. The experimental samples were collected from the sea coast of Rameshwaram, Tamil Nadu, in the form of fresh living sample. The fresh solvent extracts of K. alvarezii were found to be rich in total carotenoid content and vitamin C.  The concentration of vitamin C was found to be  9.2 mg/g.f.wt, Polyphenol 27.2mg GAE standard, gallic acid equivalent/100 g.dry.wt, β-carotene 6.52 mg/g dry.wt and total carotenoid  0.769 mg/g.f.wt. The phytochemical analysis demonstrated the presence of high carbohydrate, protein, alkaloids, glycosides, flavonoids, steroid, and phenolic compound and absence of tannin in the extracts also k. alvarezii extracts revealed macromolecules contents such as carbohydrate contents of 53 g, Protein 16.2g and fat content 1.01 g /100 g of dry wt.  Micronutrients were estimated that calcium content was 5.3g/100g and iron content was found to be more in 1.14 mg, phosphorus content of 18.7 mg, magnesium 20.6mg /100 mg of dry wt. Furthermore, the extracted material was submitted to structural analysis, by Infrared spectroscopy and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscope (H-NMR) and chemical composition analysis. The results based on spectral data IR and H-NMR revealed the presence of aliphatic constituents containing Carbon, and hydroxyl groups and both spectral studies were inferred the presence of polysaccharide compound in the crude extract when compared with standard carrageenan used in the spectral studies and the chemical structure of the isolated compound from K. alvarezii were established by spectral techniques (IR and H-NMR). Bioactive compound prepared from experimental species showed economic value, quality as polysaccharide, it can be concluded that the K. alvarezii may serve as functional food with vital pharmaceutical and biological value.