Published Paper Details:

Chitosan has attracted much attention because of its unique biological, chemical and physical properties. Chitosan serves as a promising biopolymer with a variety of potential applications in several industries. Insects are been recommend as a natural resource for chitosan production in several literatures. In the present study, Chitosan has been isolated from adult Camponotus compressus by applying standard method. Chitin and chitosan from ants compared with those extracted from shrimps, and were found to be similar. The result shows that ants and shrimp chitosan had the same degree of acetylating and degree of deacetylation of shrimp and ant chitosan was 108.1% and 80.5% respectively, following Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. The characteristic XRD strong/sharp peaks at 9.4 and 19.4� for ?-chitin are common for both ant and shrimp chitin. The percentage ash content of chitosan extracted from C. compressus was 1%, which is lower than that obtained from shrimp products. Therefore, chitosan can be obtained in a better quality and of purer form than commercially produced chitosan from shrimp. Therefore, C. compressus is a promising alternative source of chitin and chitosan.