Biomolecules Derived from Whey. Strategies for Production and Biological Properties

PEROTTI, M. C.; VÉNICA, C. I.; WOLF, I.; VÉLEZ, M. A.; PERALTA, G.; QUIBERONI, A.; BERGAMINI, C.

Biomolecules from Natural Sources: Advances and Applications

John Wiley & Sons Limited

Lugar: West Sussex; Año: 2022; p. 390 - 432

The market for functional ingredients is constantly rising due to growing health awareness among consumers and changes in eating patterns around the world, driving the growing need for healthy foods. This fact encourages the development and discovery of new ingredients and new and innovative applications to be of current research interest. Whey is an abundant and highly polluting by-product of the dairy industry. However, in the last decades, the perception of whey as a pollutant has changed with the discovery of valuable constituents with bioactive properties or the conversion of these constituents in valuable biomolecules or high added derived products. A variety of these, mainly derived from bovine milk whey, are obtained at industrial scale and commercialized for multiple applications (food, pharmaceutical, among other). In this chapter, we presented the typical physicochemical composition of whey, an overview of the technologies employed for converting whey in ingredients, their structures, nutritional and functional aspects, biological activities, purification or isolating methods, and food applications. The scientific interest of this topic is demonstrated through the large number of research papers available to date. The results published are widely variable and in some cases are controversial. Regarding the purity of the ingredient in the compound or biomolecule of interest, for some cases the technological methods are still too expensive to be applied on an industrial scale. Furthermore, the analytical tools that are necessary to verify or perform a thorough and complete characterization of the ingredient are also expensive and not routine. On the other hand, in relation to health benefits, further research is needed particularly in humans to fully substantiate the role of antihypertensive, antimicrobial and antioxidant peptides derived from whey protein, GMP, GOS and lactosucrose.