Abstract:

Generally, collagen is extracted mainly from animal skin under the aid of acids or enzymes. However, these methods usually have disadvantages of lower yield, time-consuming extraction, rigorous experimental requirements, and broken triplehelix structure. Based on the consideration of advantages and disadvantages of acid and enzymatic extraction methods, a novel approach, acid-enzyme combined method, for separating type I collagen from bovine skin was developed. This method provided a convenient process and a high yield of 54.5% within short time. In addition, products obtained could remain the natural triple helix structure. Meanwhile, a new method for identification and quality evaluation of collagen and gelatin designated as speedy identification and evaluation method was established based on qualitative and structural analysis of collagen. Therefore, the acidenzyme combined method and the speedy identification and evaluation method can offer promising practical applications in industrial production of collagen, and identification and evaluation of various commercial collagen products.

Key words: collagen, gelatin, tannin, triple helix, identification