Dietary fibre enrichment in foods for targeted health benefits: relating physical and physiological properties of hydrocolloids

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Hydrocolloids (mostly soluble polysaccharides) are multi-functional food ingredients. They deliver technological functionality to foods in the form of attributes like viscosity, gelation, and colloidal stability through their macromolecular behaviour in the aqueous phase. At the same time, these hydrocolloids act as dietary fibre and deliver a multitude of health benefits, including increased satiety, blood glucose attenuation after consumption of a meal, reduction in blood cholesterol levels through bile acid binding, fermentation in the colon to produce short-chain fatty acids, which can act to limit growth of pathogenic bacteria in the colon, improved laxation, and many other health benefits. In Canada, on average we only consume half of the recommended amount of total dietary fibre (soluble and insoluble), so supplementation of beneficial fibres into foods is an important and viable health- promoting strategy. The challenge with hydrocolloids is to provide a nutritionally- functional dose of soluble dietary fibre per food serving while not negatively altering the texture of the carrier food. The objectives of this research are to explore the relationship between the structural properties of hydrocolloids in solution (i.e., conformation, rheology) and their nutritional functionality; and, to explore novel means of enrichment of hydrocolloids into foods to deliver health benefits. The rheological and physical properties of hydrocolloids with a range of molecular structures and demonstrated health benefits will be studied in various model food matrices before and after each phase of in vitro digestion to simulate the oral, gastric and intestinal environment. We will also study their effects on various physiological biomarkers of health. The expected significance of this will be to understand more fundamentally the relationship between structure and function and therefore which hydrocolloids should be targeted for enhanced utilization in foods. In addition, novel strategies for incorporation of significant concentrations of nutritionally- functional hydrocolloids into model food systems will be explored using the enhanced knowledge gained regarding ideal stucture/ behaviour in the gastrointestinal tract that delivers specific health benefits.