**Protection and shelf life enhancement**

Some of the active substances used are chemically fragile, volatile, or unstable, and cannot be directly used without being entrapped in a capsule. One of the main advantages of using microencapsulation technology is its ability not only to protect active substances from the surrounding environment thereby increasing the shelf life of the product and its activity especially for fragrance or cosmetic applications, but also to prevent interaction with other compounds in the system or other components. The microcapsule shell capsules can prevent the evaporation of the volatile substance and protect both workers and end-users from exposure to toxic or hazardous substances; therefore, the active substances are handled more safely under this form before processing. They also transform a soluble compound in a temporarily insoluble form or realize the complex mixture of various components in a single capsule for a specific application. This process also allows masking an odor or an unpleasant fragrance of the active compounds during manufacture and end-use.
