Pulsed electric field (PEF) processing is a non-thermal technique of food preservation which consists in the application of high intensity electric fields (4-80 kV/cm) in the form of repetitive very short pulses (less than 1 s) for enzyme and microbial inactivation with minimal effect on food quality. It has previously been shown that PEF can induce non-denaturing changes in the structure of proteins such as a-lactalbumin (a-LA). The purpose of this work was to apply PEF to explore the possibility of generating beneficial changes in the functional properties of this whey protein for specific food uses. The treatments were performed in an electroporator with field intensities of 4.5, 9 and 10 kV/cm, using 2, 4, and 10 square wave pulses of 5 �s and a 0.2 Hz frequency. Solubility, foaming and emulsifying capacities were measured at pH 7 and 20�C by standard methods. The solubility of a-LA decreased for all the treatments probably due to the previously observed increase in surface hydrophobicity. In the case of all the treatments at 4.5 and 10 kV/cm, an improvement in foaming capacity could be observed (see Table 1). Finally, an increase in emulsifying capacity (5%) and emulsion stability (150%) was obtained when the a-LA was processed with 4 pulses of 9 kV/cm.    These results indicate that the functional properties of some food proteins can be improved with the use of non-thermal methods such as PEF or high hydrostatic pressures.

Effect of pulsed electric fields on some functional properties of bovine a-lactalbumin

246th National Meeting (2013)

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