Do you know gelatin, and how many kinds of types and usages it has? In this essay, I will introduce it to you.
Gelatin (also known as animal gelatin or fat gelatin) is a macromolecular hydrophilic colloid formed by the partial hydrolysis of collagen.
3 Types of Gelatin
Based on its intended use, gelatin can be divided into three types: edible gelatin, photographic gelatin, and industrial gelatin.
Edible gelatin, photographic gelatin, and industrial gelatin can each be classified into several grades based on properties such as viscosity, transparency, and melting point.
Applications of Gelatin
Gelatin, commonly known as an industrial all-purpose ingredient, has a wide range of applications.
1. Daily Use in Foods
- Daily Use
Gelatin is used in cakes, soups, aspic, salads, puddings, egg yolk sauce, and frosting. It’s widely used in daily foods.
- Specialty Food
Gelatin is an animal protein with high nutritional value. It is particularly suitable for infants, malnourished children, patients with lung disease, diabetes, and those with high fevers.
- Food Industry Uses:
In the food industry, gelatin is used as a binder in the production of fruit pastes, jelly pastries, aspic, sausages, canned meat, frozen beef, candied fruit, candy fillings, and other confections (such as soft candy, gummy candy, custard cake, nougat, chocolate, flavored candy, chewing gum, and butterscotch), as well as in Western pastries. It is also a stabilizer and emulsifier in the production of ice cream, jelly, French pastries, mayonnaise, fruit puree, gravy, frozen milk, jam, gravy powder, and jam powder. Adding gelatin to beer and soda can also enhance its richness.
2. Medical Uses
- Therapeutic Uses: In medical applications, gelatin is a hemostatic agent and an antidote for iodine and alum poisoning. It can treat hemophilia, purpura and hemorrhagic purpura, melena in infants, arteriovenous disease, epistaxis, hemoptysis, gastric bleeding, intestinal bleeding, hematuria, infantile dysentery, chronic enteritis, and arterial calcification.
- Pharmaceutical Uses: In pharmaceutical manufacturing, gelatin is used as a material for capsules, gelatin aldehyde, and gelatin glycerol. Capsules are used as outer shells for medicines (such as various mycin pills) and tonics (such as cod liver oil pills); gelatin aldehyde is used as a surgical dressing, preservative, and gelatin for wounds; gelatin glycerol is used as a base for ointments, ointments, plasters, external bougies and suppositories, lotions, coatings for microscope slides, a component of tablets, and pills.
3. Lighting Uses: High-grade gelatin (photographic glue) is the primary material for silver salt emulsions in the photosensitive layer of dry plates, photographic film, photographic prints, motion picture film, X-ray film, aviation film, and photographic paper.
- Craft Uses: Gelatin is used as an adhesive in industries like grinding wheels, sandpaper, emery cloth, wood-based panels, paper boxes, wood products, pencils, matches, and plywood. It is also used as a glazing and sizing agent in the cotton, silk, printing and dyeing, leather, and papermaking industries, as well as in the weaving of straw hats. Gelatin is essential for a variety of products and processes, including waterproofing slurries, printing rollers, plaster molds, copperplate development, colloid testing, bacterial culture, rubber products, emulsion preservation, anti-oxidant pigments, electroplating solutions, and the plastics industry. It is also used as an ingredient in various other products. Industrially, a mixture of gelatin and white pigments (such as barium sulfate) is used as an adhesive in the white primer for photographic paper. Industrial gelatin is also used as a filler in high-quality paper and banknote paper. In the publishing industry, gelatin is used as a component of dye solutions and in art decoration for books, magazines, and photocopies.