Acacia gum is the resin of the thorny African acacia tree. This hardened sap is used to make ink, watercolors, pottery pigments and wax polishes and to give a shine to fabrics such as crepe and silk. Most importantly, it is used extensively as a food stabilizer in processed foods and medicinally as a demulcent to relieve mucus irritation and heal burns and as an antimicrobial to inhibit the growth of periodontal bacteria in your mouth.
Demulcent
Acacia gum is used internally as a demulcent to relieve the irritation of inflamed mucous membranes in the throat and stomach. Its thick, gluey substance also alleviates the inflammation of moist tissue lining the intestines. The Center for New Crops and Plant Products of Purdue University reports that acacia gum is also used to relieve coughs, colds, sore throat, diarrhea and dysentery. It is known to be used as an expectorant to bring up mucus from your bronchial tubes, trachea and lungs. Further medicinal uses are the treatment of gonorrhea, typhoid and hemorrhaging. Pharmaceutically, acacia gum is used as an excipient to give form and structure in the making of pills and the manufacture of emulsions. Its ability to destroy many alkaloids such as cocaine suggests its possible use as an antidote.
Healing Wounds
Acacia gum is water soluble, and even when diluted retains its viscous nature. For this reason, it is used externally to sheathe and cover wounds and inflamed surfaces of your body. It is applied topically to burns and sore nipples. It has even been used to treat nodular leprosy, a disease that affects breast-feeding babies that is a benign clinical variant of the chronic and communicable tuberculoid leprosy.
Inhibiting Periodontal Bacteria
Acacia gum present in chewing sticks acts as an antimicrobial agent against Streptococcus fecalis in your mouth. In 1993, D.T. Clark and colleagues reported in the "Journal of Clinical Periodontology" that acacia gum can inhibit the growth and activities of pathological periodontal bacteria in the gums.
Food Stabilizer
Acacia gum is used most frequently in the food industry as an emulsifying agent and flavor fixative. Because of its stabilizing ability, it is used in practically all categories of processed foods, including fats and oils, breakfast cereals, gelatins and puddings, imitation dairy products, coconut milk, frozen dairy desserts, soups, baked goods, snack foods, alcoholic and nonalcoholic beverages, and candy.
Milk products and soups contain minute amounts of acacia gum, whereas candy may be made up of as much as 45 percent acacia gum. Also called gum arabic, it is used mainly in beverages that are cloudy, such as coconut milk and flavored milk drinks. In snack foods, it is used to stick herbs and spices on potato chips, corn chips, muesli bars and nuts. As a dry gel, it is used in hard candies and soft chewy gum sweets such as jelly beans.
Member Comments