## 3 Results and Discussion
### Water Activity  
Water activity (a\({}_{w}\)) is a physicochemical parameter that can control the food quality by determining the growth capacity of microorganisms and measuring the ratio between water pressure in the material and air pressure outside the material [38; 39]. Table 5 shows that water activity decreased with the addition of seaweed, but only F4 showed a significant  
\begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c} \hline \hline
**Formulation** & **L*** & **a*** & **b*** \\ \hline Control (C) & 54.37 \(\pm\) 0.98 \({}^{\text{a}}\) & 3.69 \(\pm\) 0.19 \({}^{\text{c}}\) & 19.17 \(\pm\) 0.91 \({}^{\text{a}}\) \\ F1 (2 KA, 1.0S) & 52.20 \(\pm\) 1.93 \({}^{\text{ab}}\) & 3.74 \(\pm\) 0.19 \({}^{\text{c}}\) & 15.52 \(\pm\) 0.34 \({}^{\text{b}}\) \\ F2 (2 KA, 1.5S) & 50.45 \(\pm\) 6.40 \({}^{\text{ab}}\) & 4.15 \(\pm\) 0.55 \({}^{\text{bc}}\) & 18.45 \(\pm\) 0.41 \({}^{\text{ab}}\) \\ F3 (4 KA, 1.0S) & 47.99 \(\pm\) 1.37 \({}^{\text{ab}}\) & 4.51 \(\pm\) 0.13 \({}^{\text{ab}}\) & 17.91 \(\pm\) 1.18 \({}^{\text{b}}\) \\ F4 (4 KA, 1.5S) & 44.80 \(\pm\) 0.68 \({}^{\text{b}}\) & 5.06 \(\pm\) 0.10 \({}^{\text{a}}\) & 17.44 \(\pm\) 1.73 \({}^{\text{b}}\) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} Mean \(\pm\) standard deviation (SD) with different lowercase superscripts showed significant differences for a different formulation of samples (\(p<0.05\)). Control = 0% _Kappaphycus alvarezii_, 1.5% salt; F1 = 2% _Kappaphys alvarezii_, 1.0% salt; F2 = 2% _Kappaphys alvarezii_, 1.5% salt; F3 = 4% _Kappaphycus alvarezii_, 1.0% salt; F4 = 4% _Kappaphys alvarezii_, 1.5% salt.  
\end{table}
Table 4: Colour of different formulation of chicken patty.  
\begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c} \hline \hline
**Formulation** & **Cooking Loss (\%)** & **Extracted Water (\%)** & **pH** \\ \hline Control (C) & 16.85 \(\pm\) 0.01 \({}^{\text{a}}\) & 12.60 \(\pm\) 0.66 \({}^{\text{a}}\) & 5.47 \(\pm\) 0.10 \({}^{\text{c}}\) \\ F1 (2 KA, 1.0S) & 15.19 \(\pm\) 0.03 \({}^{\text{b}}\) & 11.26 \(\pm\) 1.01 \({}^{\text{ab}}\) & 5.64 \(\pm\) 0.20 \({}^{\text{b}}\) \\ F2 (2 KA, 1.5S) & 12.37 \(\pm\) 0.02 \({}^{\text{c}}\) & 10.03 \(\pm\) 0.31 \({}^{\text{bc}}\) & 5.92 \(\pm\) 0.02 \({}^{\text{ab}}\) \\ F3 (4 KA, 1.0S) & 10.38 \(\pm\) 0.04 \({}^{\text{d}}\) & 8.50 \(\pm\) 0.50 \({}^{\text{cd}}\) & 6.05 \(\pm\) 0.02 \({}^{\text{a}}\) \\ F4 (4 KA, 1.5S) & 10.02 \(\pm\) 0.02 \({}^{\text{e}}\) & 8.25 \(\pm\) 0.23 \({}^{\text{d}}\) & 6.06 \(\pm\) 0.08 \({}^{\text{a}}\) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} Mean \(\pm\) standard deviation (SD) with different lowercase superscripts showed significant differences for different formulations of samples (\(p<0.05\)). Control = 0% _Kappaphys alvarezii_, 1.5% salt; F1 = 2% _Kappaphys alvarezii_, 1.0% salt; F2 = 2% _Kappaphys alvarezii_, 1.5% salt; F3 = 4% _Kappaphys alvarezii_, 1.0% salt; F4 = 4% _Kappaphys alvarezii_, 1.5% salt.  
\end{table}
Table 3: Cooking loss, percentage of extracted water, and pH reading for a different formulation of the chicken patty.  
difference (\(p<0.05\)) with the control sample. The presence of seaweed acts as a humectant, reducing the \(\mathrm{a_{w}}\). This finding agrees with [40], stating that dietary fibre from a nonmeat ingredient can act as a humectant in meat products.  
Additionally, higher salt content reduced (\(p>0.05\)) the \(\mathrm{a_{w}}\), as proved by F2 (0.936) and F4 (0.920). Salt plays an important role in maintaining the quality of meat products by reducing the water activity in meat products. Previous research reported that a reduction in salt from 1.5% to 1.0% might alter the shelf life of meat products [41]. Most pathogens require a minimum \(\mathrm{a_{w}}\) of 0.95, while the growth of _Clostridium botulinum_\(E\) required a minimum \(\mathrm{a_{w}}\) of 0.97. However, some bacteria can produce toxins in even in low \(\mathrm{a_{w}}\) conditions, such as _Listeria monocytogenes_ (\(\mathrm{a_{w}}=0.92\)) and _Staphylococcus aureus_ (\(\mathrm{a_{w}}=0.86\)) [42].