Preparation and properties of amylose complexes prepared from hexadecylamine and its hydrochloride salt.

Amylose inclusion complexes were prepared from jet-cooked aqueous mixtures of high amylose corn starch and 1-hexadecylamine (HDA). Slow-cooling produced torus/disc-shaped spherulites, whereas aggregates of smaller spherulites were obtained by rapid-cooling in ice. The morphologies and 61V X-ray diffraction patterns of these spherulites were similar to those of spherulites obtained previously with palmitic acid, indicating that spherulite morphology is influenced largely by the hydrophobic structure of the carbon chain of the complex-forming ligand and to a lesser extent by the nature of the more polar head group. Water soluble, cationic amylose inclusion complexes were prepared by adding an aqueous solution of the HCl salt of HDA to a jet-cooked dispersion of high amylose starch. The cationic nature of these HDA·HCl complexes suggests possible applications as flocculating agents for water purification and as retention aids in papermaking. Published by Elsevier Ltd.