Starches are modified to enhance their performance in different applications. Starches may be modified to increase their stability against excessive heat, acid, shear, time, cooling, or freezing; to change their texture; to decrease or increase their viscosity; to lengthen or shorten gelatinization time; or to increase their viscostability. Modified starches, starch derivatives, are prepared by physically, enzymatically, or chemically treating native starch, thereby changing the properties of the starch. Modified starches are used in practically all starch applications, such as in food products as a thickening agent, stabilizer or emulsifier; in pharmaceuticals as a disintegrater; or in paper as a binder .Carboxymethyl starch is used as an additive in oil drilling mud. Starches, especially modified starches, are also used as glues in cardboard manufacturing. Starches such as Gum Arabic and Gum Tragacanth are used as the glue for stamps and postal envelopes. They are also used in many other applications. The major Application Sector of modified starches is paper, oil drilling, textile, food / pharmaceutical, etc. Thus starch can be used in numerous possible functional application areas, including adhesion, antistaling, binding, clouding, dusting, emulsion stabilization, encapsulation, flowing aid, foam strengthening, gelling, glazing, moisture retention, molding, shaping, stabilizing and thickening. There are many types of important modified starch. To name a few some of them are physically modified starch, chemically modified starch and enzymatically modified starch. Starches can be modified in several ways to change their function as additives in products. They can be cross-linked, where the chains get stuck together into a mesh. They can be heated to break the long chains down into simpler molecules like dextrin, polydextrin, and maltodextrin. These are simply short starches. Starches can have hydrogen replaced by something else, such as a carboxymethyl group, making carboxymethyl starch. Some Indian manufacturers Gujarat Ambuja Proteins Ltd, Ahmedabad Sahyadri Starch & Chemicals (P) Ltd., Bangalore Tirupati Starch & Chem Ltd., Indore SPA Starch & Chemicals, Mumbai Karandikars Cashell Pvt. Ltd, Mumbai Universal Starch & Chemicals Ltd, Maharashtra The growth rate in demand for Starch/Modified starch is likely to be in tune with the performance and growth rate of downstream sector in the coming years. The Indian demand for the last financial year was around 75000tonnes per annum. The global production of starch is around 37 million tonnes per annum and the global demand is around 4 million tonnes per annum for modified starch. A number of potential applications of modified starch have not been exploited to a large extent. For example, modified starch can be used in various food applications as instant noodles, ham sausages, flavouring, frozen foods, beverages, ice-cream etc. Modified starch also can find application in biodegradable plastics and bioplastics, which is used in packaging, agricultural films, disposable cutlery. There is good potential for modified starch in food applications and prospects for growth seem bright. New entrepreneurs have a very good scope for exploration into such segments.
