• Advanced Questions

  Protein hydrolysis

  Posted by belassi on May 30, 2016 at 4:52 am

  I’ve decided to start a separate thread for this because it seems quite interesting (to me at least)
  Experiment #1: hydrolysis of oats

  Materials:
  Oat flour 5g
  Potassium hydroxide 2g
  Water 91g qs 100%
  Citric acid 2g qs pH=7

  Method:
  * Dissolve 2g KOH in 40g distilled water.
  * Add 5g oat flour (see note 1)
  * Mix continuously. as the flour hydrolyses, you should see the colour darkening to a coffee colour and at the same time it will become gum-like and thicken.
  * Add the remaining water slowly while continuing to mix.
  * When homogenous, microwave to 50C. Continue to mix. Preferably do not use high shear as it has a tendency to foam.
  Allow to stand for 30 min. or until insolubles have fallen to the bottom.
  Decant. (Preferably use a separation funnel)
  Add 2g citric acid q/s to pH = 7 according to the pH meter.
  You should see the colour change back again from coffee or tan, to oatmeal cream. At the same time you will note the characteristic odour of hydrolysed proteins.

  Notes
  (1) The oat flour was prepared by milling Quaker Oats in a spice grinder, then sieving, then milling again.
  (2) The product appears to enhance foam (markedly) in synthetic soaps but kills foam in natural soaps. It has “gum” sensorials. May make a useful secondary thickener.

  belassi replied 8 years, 7 months ago 2 Members · 3 Replies
• 3 Replies

• 

  beautynerd

  Member

  May 30, 2016 at 6:54 pm

  Thanks for posting this @Belassi, was interested to know how you achieved hydrolysis.
  

• 

  belassi

  Member

  May 30, 2016 at 7:04 pm

  You’re welcome. The next experiment is to determine the minimum amount of KOH so as to minimise the % of potassium citrate in the final solution.

• 

  belassi

  Member

  June 4, 2016 at 1:14 am

  By a strange coincidence one of the reps called me today to ask if I would like a sample of hydrolysed oat protein. Of course I said yes. This is especially interesting because I will be able to compare it with my DIY version.

  It occurs to me to experiment further, but I am going to have problems with lack of equipment. I’d really need a press. I guess soy beans would be another easy candidate.

  Now for my question. Let’s say I want to make a shampoo with 1% colloidal oatmeal. But 10g oatmeal hydrolysed to 100mL makes a pretty gummy protein solution. How to calculate how much to put in???

Log In to Reply