Kinetics of Water Vapor Absorption by Sodium Alginate-based Films

Water vapor sorption by sodium alginate-based films may result in swelling and conformational changes in the molecular structure and affecting the water vapor barrier properties. Sodium alginate film specimens were dried in a vacuum freeze dryer and their moisture content was determined by an air-oven method. The water vapor absorption was determined at two different levels of water activities (0.727 and 0.995) and at three temperatures (10, 20, and $30^{\circ}C$), and kinetics were analyzed using a simple empirical model. Reasonably good straight lines were obtained with plotting of 1/($m-m_0$) vs 1/t. It was found that water vapor absorption kinetics of sodium alginate films were accurately described by a simple empirical model. The rate of water vapor sorption increased with increase in temperature and it showed temperature dependency following the Arrhenius equation. The activation energies varied from 49.18$\sim$149.55 kJ/mol depending on the relative humidity.