Ultrasound-made egg white nanoparticles as carriers of folic acid

CAROLINA ARZENI; OSCAR E PÉREZ; ANA MR PILOSOF

París

Congreso; Delivery of Functionality in Complex Food Systems; 2015

AgroParisTech - INRA

Egg white is a protein ingredient that imparts multiple functional properties such as gelling, foaming and emulsification in many food products. The major proteins imparting functionality are ovalbumin (54%), conalbumin (12%), ovomucoid (11%) and lysozyme (3.5%) (Li-Chan, Powrie, & Nakai, 1995). High intensity ultrasound (HIUS) technology has been proved to be effective in controlling particle size of different biopolymers (Gordon & Pilosof, 2010; Vila, Sanchez, Tobio, Calvo, & Alonso, 2002). By controlling the conditions used for the sonication treatment, i.e. temperature and time of processing, as well as pH conditions, it is possible to control particle size of egg white (EW). On the other hand, folic acid (FA), an important B-group vitamin, participates in many metabolic pathways such as DNA and RNA biosynthesis and amino acid interconversions. It is involved in essential functions of cell metabolism such as DNA replication, repair and methylation and synthesis of nucleotides, amino acids, and some vitamins. Mammalian cells cannot synthesize folate; therefore, an exogenous supply of this vitamin is necessary to prevent nutritional deficiency (Iyer & Tomar, 2009). However, FA is unstable to heating and light exposure, especially at acid pH. Therefore, the formation of complexes with proteins might enhance its stability during food manufacturing processes where the vitamin is incorporated (Liang, Zhang, Zhou, & Subirade, 2013). Thus, the aim of this work was to produce and characterize FA complexes with EW nanoparticles.