Highly soluble magnesium oxide

for the food and food supplement industry

What is magnesium Oxide?

Mag­ne­sium oxide is a chem­i­cal com­pound with the for­mu­la MgO. Mag­ne­sium oxide is inor­gan­ic, con­sists of white crys­tals, and is nor­mal­ly insol­u­ble in water. It has a high ele­men­tal mag­ne­sium con­tent of approx­i­mate­ly 58–60 % and can be used in food sup­ple­ments where space is lim­it­ed, such as tablets or cap­sules. It is also often used to increase the mag­ne­sium con­tent in prod­ucts that can­not be achieved with pure­ly organ­ic mag­ne­sium sources alone.

Overview:

Mag­ne­sium oxide, con­sists of a mag­ne­sium cation (Mg²⁺) and an oxy­gen anion (O²-)

Mol­e­c­u­lar weight: 40.3 g/mol

Bulk Den­si­ty: 150–850 g/L (depend­ing on product)

Formed by cal­ci­na­tion of mag­ne­sium hydrox­ide or mag­ne­sium carbonate

Min­er­al con­tent in %: Approx. 60 %

How is magnesium oxide produced?

Mag­ne­sium oxide is formed by cal­ci­na­tion (heat­ing a chem­i­cal com­pound below its melt­ing point to cause par­tial chem­i­cal decom­po­si­tion) of mag­ne­sium hydrox­ide (Mg(OH)2) or mag­ne­sium car­bon­ate (MgCO3). The cal­ci­na­tion tem­per­a­ture has a sig­nif­i­cant influ­ence on the prop­er­ties of mag­ne­sium oxide (MgO).

In which industries and for which products can magnesium oxide be used?

In med­i­cine, it is used as an antacid and source of mag­ne­sium. In the food indus­try, it is reg­is­tered as a food addi­tive E530, serves as a pH reg­u­la­tor and is also approved for the for­ti­fi­ca­tion of food prod­ucts and sup­ple­ments with magnesium.

1. Crys­tal struc­ture and phase purity:

  • Low tem­per­a­tures: At low cal­ci­na­tion tem­per­a­tures, an amor­phous mag­ne­sium oxide is often obtained
  • Medi­um tem­per­a­tures: At these tem­per­a­tures, well-crys­tal­lized MgO is usu­al­ly pro­duced. The struc­ture becomes denser and more crys­talline, which can improve the mechan­i­cal properties
  • High tem­per­a­tures: Very high cal­ci­na­tion tem­per­a­tures lead to a fur­ther increase in crys­tallini­ty. The result­ing MgO is very sta­ble and dense

2. Particle size and surface structure:

  • Low tem­per­a­tures: The result­ing MgO often has a high spe­cif­ic sur­face area. This leads to a high­er reac­tiv­i­ty, as more sur­face area is avail­able for chem­i­cal reactions.
  • High tem­per­a­tures: The spe­cif­ic sur­face area decreas­es. This can reduce the reac­tiv­i­ty of the MgO.

3. Porosity:

  • Low to medi­um tem­per­a­tures: MgO cal­cined at low­er tem­per­a­tures tends to have a high­er poros­i­ty, which makes it suit­able for use as a cat­a­lyst or adsorbent.
  • High tem­per­a­tures: Poros­i­ty decreas­es as the par­ti­cles become denser and the pore struc­ture par­tial­ly clos­es. This can increase the den­si­ty but reduce the spe­cif­ic sur­face area and porosity.

4. Reactivity and solubility:

  • Low tem­per­a­tures: Due to the high­er spe­cif­ic sur­face area, the MgO is more reac­tive and eas­i­er to dissolve.
  • High tem­per­a­tures: MgO cal­cined at high­er tem­per­a­tures has a low­er reac­tiv­i­ty and solubility.

In which food supplements is magnesium oxide typically used?

Our Inno­va mar­ket research has shown that mag­ne­sium oxide is main­ly processed in tablets and cap­sules (see chart below). This is because mag­ne­sium oxide is ide­al for this dosage form, as its high ele­men­tal mag­ne­sium con­tent requires only a small of the raw mate­r­i­al com­pared to oth­er forms of mag­ne­sium com­pounds. By using our high­ly sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide, effer­ves­cent tablets and pow­der can be added to the range of use­ful dosage forms.

Why is the solubility of magnesium important for liquid applications?

Espe­cial­ly in liq­uid appli­ca­tions or dis­so­lu­tion appli­ca­tions, the con­sumer expects a residue and sed­i­ment-free solu­tion. Prod­uct devel­op­ers there­fore often look for min­er­al com­pounds that meet these require­ments. In the past, the poor sol­u­bil­i­ty of mag­ne­sium oxide in water posed prob­lems for the food and sup­ple­ment indus­try. We have now found a solu­tion to this prob­lem with our high­ly active and sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide.

What makes our magnesium oxide a highly soluble magnesium oxide?

In tests with mag­ne­sium oxides in effer­ves­cent pow­ders, we found that a high­ly active mag­ne­sium oxide vari­ant dis­solves sed­i­ment- and residue-free dur­ing the dis­so­lu­tion time of the effer­ves­cent pow­der. The rea­son for this is the cit­ric acid added to the solu­tion. It caus­es the solu­tion to acquire an acidic pH val­ue and improves the ion­iza­tion (dis­so­lu­tion) of the mag­ne­sium oxide. This sol­u­bil­i­ty described in this exper­i­ment is also trans­fer­able to the much stronger stom­ach acid. The high­ly sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide can be dis­solved (ion­ized) by gas­tric acid, too, and thus, is bioavail­able. The described high­ly sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide can there­fore be used in both dry and liq­uid appli­ca­tions. Due to the high ele­men­tal mag­ne­sium con­tent, only small quan­ti­ties of our high­ly active sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide need to be applied to achieve the desired mag­ne­sium con­tent in the end application.

Hochauflösendes Magnesiumoxid im Vergleich zu einem normalen Magnesiumoxid in Bezug auf Löslichkeit
The sol­u­bil­i­ty of the high­ly sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide (right) com­pared to a reg­u­lar mag­ne­sium oxide (left) in 2% cit­ric acid with­out fur­ther addi­tives is clear­ly recognizable.

Bioavailability of magnesium oxide

In gen­er­al, reg­u­lar mag­ne­sium oxides have very lim­it­ed bioavail­abil­i­ty due to their poor sol­u­bil­i­ty. By improv­ing the sol­u­bil­i­ty, the bioavail­abil­i­ty is also increased – as seen in the exam­ple of our high­ly sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide above. The bioavail­abil­i­ty of mag­ne­sium oxide can also be influ­enced by the dosage form. A study shows that the bioavail­abil­i­ty of mag­ne­sium oxide in effer­ves­cent tablets is twice as high com­pared to mag­ne­sium oxide in cap­sules. This sug­gests that the dis­so­lu­tion of mag­ne­sium oxide in water (ion­iza­tion to Mg2+) is an impor­tant pre­req­ui­site for its absorp­tion. Con­se­quent­ly, the bioavail­abil­i­ty of dissolved/ionized mag­ne­sium oxide is com­pa­ra­ble to that of organ­ic mag­ne­sium salts (e.g. mag­ne­sium cit­rate, mag­ne­sium glu­conate, etc.). These find­ings apply to the high­ly active mag­ne­sium oxide from MAGNESIA. This prod­uct offers good sol­u­bil­i­ty in dilut­ed organ­ic acids such as cit­ric acid or mal­ic acid, which are main­ly used as acid­i­fiers in food sup­ple­ments. This makes our high­ly sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide ide­al for effer­ves­cent pow­ders and tablets, which always con­tain an acid com­po­nent per se.

Highly soluble magnesium oxide – minimum order quantity and samples

Our high­ly sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide is avail­able in pow­der form. Unit sizes start from 25 kg. Sam­ples are of course avail­able to you free of charge. We also offer var­i­ous oth­er qual­i­ties of clas­sic mag­ne­sium oxides for use in food and nutri­tion­al sup­ple­ments. Feel free to con­tact us — our sales team and our nutri­tion­ists will be hap­py to sup­port you.

MAGNESIA 2225020

High­ly active sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide, EP, USP, FCC
Ca. 57 % Mg

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Whitepaper

Read our whitepa­per on high­ly active and sol­u­ble mag­ne­sium oxide 

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Contact us now

Chris­t­ian Nega and the NEM team sup­ports you with tech­ni­cal know-how and finds tai­lor-made solu­tions for your prod­uct idea. 

Also ask for detailed infor­ma­tion about spec­i­fi­ca­tions, safe­ty data sheets or mate­r­i­al sam­ples.

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