Bioactive peptides in the reformulated food

AMBROSSI V; AÑÓN MC; CHAMORRO V; GODOY MF; PAZOS A; PIGUIN D; SCILINGO A; TIRONI V

Strategies to Improve the Quality of Foods

Elsevier

Año: 2023;

Reformulated foodThe availability and consumption of processed foods has increased significantly over the years due to factors such as globalization, lifestyle, convenience, economics, consumer preferences, and processing technologies (Albuquerque et al., 2018; Raikos & Ranawana, 2019).It is therefore evident that processed foods are consumed by a large proportion of consumers and, depending on their choices, could potentially lead to unbalanced diets promoting long-term morbidity.The term “processed foods” is often associated with negative connotations; however, processing can help improve the safety, digestibility, shelf life and sustainability of foods and produce those with beneficial health and nutritional profiles. Alternatively, all foods have a place in a healthy and balanced diet, and consumers have a responsibility to make informed and balanced choices.Improving the health properties and nutritional balance of processed foods through reformulation could help improve the overall quality of people's diets.Food reformulation plays an important role within this framework, as nutritional improvements in the food supply can have significant benefits at the population level. Therefore, reformulation is becoming a priority area for intervention with high-level support seen at the European Union, United Nations, and national levels (Raikos & Ranawana, 2019).Food reformulation can be defined as the action taken by the food industry to redesign an existing processed food product, intended for daily consumption, with the main objective of improving its nutritional profile.Traditionally, food reformulation has the goal of reducing the levels of salt, sugar, and saturated and trans fats in processed foods (Jiménez-Colmenero, 2000; Kloss et al., 2015).It can be used as a strategy to improve the nutritional characteristics of foods through the introduction of essential macro and micronutrients, bioactive peptides, natural products or phytochemicals (National Heart Foundation of Australia, 2012).In addition, food reformulation could be a good option to improve the sustainability of food production by introducing agricultural and processing waste from the food chain.Initiatives should preferably focus on foods commonly consumed by all socioeconomic classes in a population. Basic foods belong to one of the main food categories: cereals and cereal products, fruits and vegetables, meat and fish and eggs, milk and dairy products, fats and oils, and beverages (Van Raaij et al., 2009).Bioactive Peptides Proteins are well known for their nutritional, functional and biological properties. Amino acids are essential for physical development, growth, maintenance, repair, and proper function of organs and cells in the body (Manikkam et al., 2016). To exert biological effects, dietary proteins must be digested into peptides and amino acids, which are then absorbed in adequate concentrations into the bloodstream. Bioactive peptides that are encrypted in primary protein sequences can be released by the action of exogenous and endogenous proteolytic enzymes, by microbial fermentation or during food processing (Singh et al., 2022).Food-derived bioactive peptides (BAPs) have gained interest as functional compounds due to their potential health benefits (Patil et al., 2022).Diverse peptides have been identified as specific sequences that have beneficial pharmacological or preventive properties for human health (Nong & Hsu, 2022). In the case of bioactive peptides, there are numerous reports that account for their multiple biological actions, that can be summarized as an improvement in health or prevention of diseases in those subjects who consume them: antioxidant, antihypertensive, antithrombotic, antimicrobial activity, etc. (Xing et al., 2021, Cicero et al., 2017, Li & Yu, 2015). The strategies to use bioactive peptides as ingredients in foods are the addition of the parent protein, which releases the peptide after the digestive process, or the direct incorporation of bioactives obtained from a previous enzymatic hydrolysis. Regardless of the alternative used, it entails certain complications, like the difficulty of reaching the effective dose of the peptide to achieve the desired effect, in the first case, or the potential decrease in consumer acceptability due to the bitterness that these compounds use to have in the product, in the second case (Macho-González et al., 2021). Through in vitro, in silico, and in vivo examinations, beneficial effects of BAPs on antioxidant, antidiabetic, antihypertensive, or multiple functional activities have been discovered.