| abstract |
Personal care or cosmetic oil in water emulsions include an oil emulsifier and a combination of a Xanthan polysaccharide and a polyglucomannan polysaccharide to provide enhanced stability even at low emulsifier stabiliser levels. The emulsifier stabiliser system provides stable emulsions without dominating system rheology, particularly viscosity. Thus, the emulsions can have a low viscosity suitable for formulation as milks or thin lotions, or can be thickened, desirably by thickening agents other than the Xanthan and/or polyglucomannan, to provide emulsion creams or gels. This enables the system to be used very flexibly in end use applications. The emulsifier is desirably a non-ionic emulsifier and particularly is a combination of a low HLB and a high HLB emulsifier and can be formulated with conventional alcohol ethoxylate surfactants or from non-EO surfactants e.g. sucrose ester high HLB surfactants and citrate or sorbitan ester low HLB surfactants. |