Post succinylation effects on morphological, functional and textural characteristics of acid-thinned pearl millet starches

The effect of succinylation on acid-thinned pearl millet starches hydrolyzed to different levels using 0.1 M and 1 M HCl solutions were studied in terms of morphological, physicochemical, pasting, and textural characteristics. Scanning electron micrographs showed erosion and indentations on surface of dual modified succinylated acid-thinned starches. The results revealed that succinylation of native and acid-thinned starches increased the swelling power and paste clarity significantly. The re-association tendency was greatly reduced in dual modified starches as no retrogradation peak was observed during thermal analysis even after 14 days of refrigerated storage at 4 °C. Also, succinylated acid-thinned starches demonstrated better cold-storage stability with respect to various textural attributes like hardness, chewiness, springiness and cohesiveness when compared to acid-thinned and native starches. Succinylated starch showed 22.6% retrogradation as opposed to 49.1% for unmodified starch. In a nutshell, succinylation is a promising method to overcome high susceptibility of retrogradation in acid-thinned starches.