This proposal requests funds to permit Dr. Elvin T. Choong, Professor of Forestry, Louisiana State University, to pursue with Dr. Suminar S. Achmadi, Lecturer in Chemistry, Bogor Agricultural University, Indonesia, for a period of 24 months, a program of cooperative research on the chemistry of mangrove bark tannins. An acetone-water solution will be used to extract tannins from the bark of Bruguiera sp. and Rhizophora sp. - tree species from mangrove forests of Indonesia. The crude tannin extracts will be fractionated, and the fractions will be characterized for structure, molecular weight distribution, and identification of constituent compounds. These compounds will be further studied for potential uses as specialty chemicals. The mangrove forests of Southeast Asia constitute a huge renewable resource of wood and bark. With proper management, this resource could be exploited without affecting its essential role in estuary ecology. Indonesia contains 20% of the world's mangrove forests. The bark from mangrove trees is an important source of tannins which are used for leather manufacture and preservative treatment of cloth. Mangrove bark is also the source of reactive phenols which are useful in a wide variety of specialty chemical applications. The collaborators will isolate, characterize, and identify tannins from mangrove trees. The U.S. and Indonesian collaborators have a record of successful collaboration in the field of the proposal. This project is relevant to the objectives of the Science in Developing Countries Program which seeks to increase the level of cooperation between U.S. and developing country scientists and engineers through the exchange of scientific information, ideas, skills, and techniques and through collaboration on problems of mutual benefit.
