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Arizona Chemical and Penreco provide a number of good gellants for solvents. I notice you are at Kingsford, so I'm guessing this is not for personal care, but depending upon your application and the level of "green" you are considering, there are also a bunch of natural sourced waxes and butters that can be useful in this capacity. Earth Supplied Products is a good one-stop source for many of these, and there are a variety of specialty suppliers for specific types.
The materials above would be dissolved in your solvent at 1-20%, but as Greg highlights, there are also methods that are physical-only, without requiring a solvated gellant. There are also hybrid structuring approaches combining a solvated component and a non-solvated component (think emulsions/suspensions) that can provide unique flow characteristics.
My firm Capsulent has significant expertise in organic phase rheology and I would be glad to discuss your specific application offline if that might be helpful.
Hi Keri,
I work with several companies that provide alternates to current disinfecting actives. A number of our clients are interested to move away from traditional trichlosan and/or strictly quat-based disinfectants, and there is definitely a drive to reduce alcohol levels specifically in the hand sanitizer arena.
The newer actives are typically based on essential oils, usually combined with a divalent metal cation like Cu++ or Zn++. What is particularly attractive about these is data showing that major target bacteria do not evolve resistance at the high rates seen with the previous generation of technology.
Two companies with products in this arena are Earth Supplied Products and VSP, and Robertet Fragrance has a variety of fragrance components that serve dual duty as antimicrobials as well. I can provide specific contacts at these companies if you have interest.
Best,
Tycho
Hi Bella,
While a reputable encapsulation provider should focus on your product goals, it would be good to have these well-defined when confronting what can be an intimidating array of technologies. Encapsulation can provide a variety of benefits, including protection of sensitive materials from degradation, controlled or prolonged release of materials, triggered release (like scratch-and-sniff), among others, and it will help your provider to have a clear understanding of your specific product goals.
There are also a variety of technologies sold as "encapsulation", ranging from highly stabilized emulsions to thick-shelled walled microcapsules to porous materials that can absorb an active material. Crudely, the more "capsule" material it takes to carry a volume of the "payload" material, the higher the materials cost associated with that technology. The markups can be very high, so it is important to try to match the technology to your goals from the beginning.
My firm, Capsulent, provides a unique charged-film walled microcapsule that has exceptionally high payloads (> 99%) and shows strong affinity for fabric, skin, and hair, promoting transfer of benefit agents for more cost-effective utilization. Additional information is available at www.capsulent.com, and I would be very happy to contribute to your selecting the most appropriate technology for your project. I can be reached direct at 831-212-8714.
Best,
Tycho
It's especially challenging to map from the food world to personal care because the micro demands are so much different. A personal care formulation will be subjected to direct skin contact, then left at room temp for weeks. Try that with food! Nonetheless this was helpful to me as well Thomas, thanks.
If you are really formulating a personal care product to a "food" spec, it seems like you might need to consider a single-serve approach, or working with significantly different dispensing containers. You can sterilize your product initially, but contamination from use will be hard to beat unless you use an airless dispenser.
So shelf-life is probably not the main issue if you can incur up-front sanitizing costs. Can you share roughly how long you need the product to last after first use?
Hi. I've just joined, so apologies for not being timely. I have been exploring some "natural" materials for use (mostly in topical systems). Of course it depends if you are trying to preserve against oxidation, or if you are looking for antimicrobial activity as well. Vitamin E is great as an antioxidant, but doesn't do anything with regard to micro as far as I know--it's also challenging to formulate.
For micro, sorbates and benzoates can work very well, although some molds seem to be able to evade their activity. Benzoin and Vannilin have strong odors that might or might not suit your application. You are right to be wary of benzoates from everything I hear, despite their long history of safe use. I'm currently particularly interested in a biomolecule produced in kimchee fermentation. A company called Active Micro Systems in Piscataway, NJ makes what they call AMS Leucidal Liquid, for which they have nice looking kill data below pH 9. The material is used at about 2% and doesn't have any particular odor (which was a concern in my application). Hope some of that might be useful.
Desiree are you looking for micro or oxidation in the beverage?