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 30oC), and kinetics were analyzed using a simple empirical model. Reasonably good straight lines were obtained with plotting of 1/(m-m0) 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?149.55 kJ/mol depending on the relative humidity.