The use of astaxanthin(Haematococcus Pluvialis) as a food ingredient may have a double function. On the one hand, technological functionality, as they present an intense red color that can provide foods with an attractive reddish color. Furthermore, their antioxidant activity would protect food during processing and storage, improving quality. On the other hand, astaxanthin may play a bioactive function when consumed, so they have great potential for developing functional foods.

Due to the trend to use natural additives to replace synthetic ones and the increasing consumer concern with the diet-health relationship, astaxanthin presents great potential as a food ingredient. However, some properties limit the use of astaxanthin as a food ingredient, such as instability, low solubility, bioaccessibility, bioavailability, and difficult dosage and manipulation.

Encapsulation involves coating a pure material or a mixture (known as a core material or active compound) into another material (called the capsule, wall, or shell). It provides a physical barrier between the core compound and the surrounding media, offering possibilities for many potential applications in the food, agrochemical, and pharmaceutical sectors. Encapsulation may help to overcome most of the problems that astaxanthin may present to use them as a food ingredient, including:

  1. Enhancing the organoleptic characteristics of the food product by masking undesirable flavor and odor.
  2. Helping the handling and dosage by converting a lipid extract or oleoresin into a powder and dilution effect in the wall material.
  3. Increasing solubility and dispersibility in food matrices, thus improving coloring capacity, bio-accessibility, and bio-availability.
  4. Improving cell membrane transport, which also enhances bio-availability.
  5. Improving bio-activity derived from increased solubility, bio-availability, and cell membrane transport.
  6. Protecting from degradation or loss of functionality due to thermal treatment, light, oxygen, pH, moisture, or interaction with food matrix components.
  7. Controlling the release rates under specific conditions.