Journal of Food Science最新文献

It is time to acknowledge our top reviewer for the past year. Annually, we recognize one reviewer for his/her contributions to the journal, in honor of Manfred Kroger. Dr. Kroger was a long-term editor for Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety (CRFSFS), well known for his diligence in making sure manuscripts were top notch. Much of the credit for the early success of CRFSFS goes to Dr. Kroger.

To select the Kroger award winner, the Associate Editors first nominate reviewers who have done exceptional review work for them in the past few years, using reviewer performance data to support their nominations. The Scientific Editors then vote as to which candidate should receive the award. The award is based on a number of factors; the number of reviews is important, but also the timeliness and quality of the reviews. The award is presented in person at our annual Reviewers’ Reception at IFT FIRST.

This year's Manfred Kroger award goes to Dr. Han-Seok Seo of the University of Arkansas, a leading expert in sensory analysis and an outstanding reviewer. He has completed 90 reviews in the last 5 years, averaging 11.6 days turnaround. Clearly, Dr. Seo deserves the 2023 Kroger award.

Seo: The scientific journal's organizational structure mirrors that of a soccer team. A typical soccer team's positions, that is, a goalkeeper, defenders, midfielders, and forwards, and their roles correspond, respectively, to an editor in chief, scientific/associate editors, peer reviewers, and authors. Like midfielders who help forwards score the balls or block the opposing team's attempts at scoring before reaching the defensive line, peer reviewers provide authors with helpful comments to improve the quality of their manuscripts. Moreover, peer reviewers play a crucial role in preventing inaccurate, low-quality, and misleading manuscripts from being published by carefully reviewing them. As the midfielder position is considered the engine of a soccer team, peer reviewers are a key component of the journal system. As a journal gains more well-trained, dedicated, and enthusiastic reviewers, its impact significantly grows, like how skilled, committed, and spirited players improve a soccer team's performance. Also, a combination of reviewers from diverse backgrounds and career levels plays an important role in strengthening a journal's review system, similar to how harmonious chemistry between junior and senior players enhances a soccer team's performance. We actively encourage junior scientists to engage in the peer review process. However, I would like to use this opportunity to emphasize the importance of involving peers from a diverse spectrum of backgrounds and career stages, including established scholars and industry researchers, in reviewing manuscripts. Since established scholars and industry researchers may offer insights and perspectives that may be overlooked by junior scientists, I hope they also actively join

Food fraud is a problematic yet common phenomenon in the food industry. It impacts numerous sectors, including the market of edible mushrooms. Morel mushrooms are prized worldwide for their culinary and medicinal use. They represent a taxonomically complex group in which food fraud has already been reported. Among the methods to evaluate food fraud, some rely on comparisons of genetic sequences obtained from a sample to existing databases. However, the quality and usefulness of the results are limited by the type of comparison tool and the quality of the database used. The Centroid-based approach is applied by SmartGene in a proprietary artificial intelligence-based method for the generation of automatically curated reference databases that can be further expert curated. In this study, using sequences of the ribosomal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) of the genus Morchella (true morels), we compared this approach to the traditional pairwise alignment tool using two other databases: UNITE and Mycobank (MLST). The Centroid-based approach using an expert-curated database was more performant for the identification of 53 representative ITS sequences corresponding to validated species (83% accuracy, compared to 36% and 47% accuracy for UNITE and MLST, respectively). The Centroid method also revealed an inaccurate taxonomic annotation for sequences of commercial cultivars submitted to public databases. Combined with the web-based commercial software IDNS® available at Smartgene, the Centroid-based approach constitutes a valuable tool to ensure the quality of morel products on the market for actors of the food industry. PRACTICAL APPLICATION: The Centroid-based approach can be used by agri-food actors who need to identify true morels down to the species level without any prior taxonomical knowledge. These include routine laboratories of the food industry, food distributors, and public surveillance agencies. This is a reliable method that requires minimal skills and resources, therefore being particularly adapted for nonspecialists.

The wide biological activity of the Moringa oleifera represents a potential opportunity for developing selective cancer treatment drugs. The bioactive phytochemicals in Moringa seed extract (MSE) indicated large numbers of phytochemicals (21 compounds) with dominant abundance for cycloisolongifolene, 8,9-dehydro-9-vinyl, and chamazulene accounting for 12.7% and 12.19% of the total detected compounds. The MSE showed a potent anticancer effect toward Caco-2, MDA, and HepG-2 cells with half-maximal inhibitory concentration (IC₅₀) values of 9.15 ± 1.18, 4.85 ± 0.11, and 7.36 ± 0.22 µg/mL, respectively, with higher safety (≥31-folds) toward normal human cells (IC₅₀ of 150.7 ± 11.11 µg/mL). It appears that MSE stimulates selective-dose-dependent cell shrinkage, and nuclear condensation in the tumor cells, which finally induces the apoptosis pathway to increase its anticancer action. Additionally, MSE showed a potent capability to stimulate cell cycle arrest in both main checkpoint phases (G0/G1 and G2/M) of cell population growth. The apoptotic death stimulation was confirmed through upregulation of tumor protein p53 (p53) and cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor p21 (p21) expression by more than three- to sixfold and downregulation of B-cell lymphoma 2 expression (threefold) in MSE-treated cells compared to 5-fluorouracil (5-FU)-treated tumor cells. Furthermore, the MSE revealed strong anti-inflammatory activity with significant antioxidant activity by lowering nitric oxide levels and enhancing the superoxide dismutase activity. On the other hand, the MSE revealed broad-spectrum antibacterial activity in a dose-dependent manner against Staphylococcus aureus minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC of 1.25 mg/mL), followed by Salmonella typhimurium (MIC of 1.23 mg/mL), whereas Escherichia coli was the least sensitive to MSE activity (MIC of 22.5 mg/mL) with significant antibiofilm activity against sensitive pathogens.

Color changes in wheat and cooking water, which affect the quality of bulgur and wastewater, are important. Understanding the impacts of cooking water acidity, hardness, and iron content is significant for producing bright-yellow colored bulgur and determining the possible negative effects of cooking water on the environment. Thereby, the gelatinization degree and color (L*, a*, b*, and yellowness index) of wheat cooked with waters at different pH (3, 5, 7, 9, and 11), hardness (soft, hard, and very hard), and iron content (0, 1, and 2 mg/L) were determined every 10 min of cooking. pH, Brix, conductivity, hardness, turbidity, and color of cooking waters were also determined and kinetically modeled. After cooking, it was revealed that cooking with water at pH 3 favored the color of cooked wheat, whereas pH 11 caused darkening. Nevertheless, as the wastewater pH of cooking waters with pH 3 and 11 may be harmful to the environment, it is recommended to use water in the range of pH 5-9 for bulgur production. Cooking with very hard water is also not recommended as it causes some adverse effects such as diminishing the gelatinization rate in wheat, increasing the cooking time, and negatively affecting the color.

Soybean protein isolate (SPI) is a highly functional protein source used in various food applications, such as emulsion, gelatin, and food packaging. However, its commercial application may be limited due to its poor mechanical properties, barrier properties, and high water sensitivity. Studies have shown that modifying SPI through glycosylation can enhance its functional properties and biological activities, resulting in better application performance. This paper reviews the recent studies on glycosylation modification of SPI, including its quantification method, structural improvements, and enhancement of its functional properties, such as solubility, gelation, emulsifying, and foaming. The review also discusses how glycosylation affects the bioactivity of SPI, such as its antioxidant and antibacterial activity. This review aims to provide a reference for further research on glycosylation modification and lay a foundation for applying SPI in various fields.

It is widely accepted that milk provides the greatest relief from capsaicin burn, an effect typically attributed to its fat content and temperature. Previously, Lawless et al. reported partitioning lipophilic capsaicin in fat reduces burn, whereas Green showed lower temperature reduces burn. Recent research shows that dairy and nondairy proteins also reduce capsaicin burn, suggesting that multiple factors reduce oral burn from chilies. Here, we investigated the effectiveness of palate cleansers with varied viscosities, temperatures, and sugar, fat, and protein content. Specifically, we tested ice cream, Italian ice, yogurt, lassi, cold water (4°C), and warm water (37°C). Participants rinsed with a 5 ppm capsaicin solution, followed by a palate cleanser, before rating burn intensity continuously for 2 min on a general Labeled Magnitude Scale. Inspection of the time-intensity (TI) curves revealed all palate cleansers performed better than warm water. Italian ice performed on par with cold water, which did better than yogurt. Pairwise comparisons showed that ice cream and lassi had significantly lower burn ratings at some time points relative to warm or cold water. We extracted scaffolding parameters for each TI curve, finding that ice cream and lassi had the lowest areas-under-the-curve and the greatest percent decrease from their maxima, with ice cream performing slightly better in both parameters. These data support the view that it is not just one characteristic of a product, but rather a combination of product factors that reduce oral burn, including fat content, protein content, and temperature. More research is required to determine the relative weight of these factors in combination, given the multiple mechanisms underlying burn reduction.

Mung bean sprouts are widely consumed as a seasonal fresh vegetable, renowned for their affordability and richness in antioxidants and bioactive compounds. This study employed ultra-high-performance liquid chromatogram-Q-Exactive HF mass spectrometry (UHPLC-QE-MS) and multivariate statistical analysis to comprehensively evaluate the chemical profile of mung bean sprouts following sulfite immersion. The findings revealed a significant alteration in the overall chemical composition of mung bean sprouts following sodium sulfite immersion. Eleven components, including four sulfur-containing compounds, were identified as characteristic markers distinguishing between non-immersed and sodium sulfite-immersed mung bean sprouts. Esterification and addition reactions were inferred to occur during sodium sulfite immersion, leading to the transformation of flavonoid and saponin sulfates. Commercial samples analysis indicated that sulfur-containing compounds were detectable in 9 of 11 commercial mung bean sprouts. Meanwhile, when sodium sulfite concentration exceeded 3.00 mg/mL and immersion time exceeded 360 min, the contents of total polyphenol and flavonoid were significantly reduced and the antioxidant activity was adversely influenced.

The deterioration of the quality of raw liquor caused by the low content of ethyl hexanoate in Nongxiangxing baijiu has become a pervasive problem in the baijiu industry. Therefore, this study attempted to increase the synthesis of ethyl hexanoate by microorganisms with high esterase activity to increase Zaopei fermentation. The results showed that biofortification was a feasible and important way to improve the quality of the raw liquor and increase the ethyl hexanoate content. Adding Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus epidermidis, and Millerozyma farinosa for biofortified fermentation disturbed the microbial community structure of Zaopei and increased the abundance of Wickerhamomyces, Saccharomyces, and Thermoascus. The contents of ethyl hexanoate, ethyl valerate, ethyl caprylate, and ethyl heptanoate also increased noticeably in baijiu. The results of E-nose and sensory analysis tested and verified that the baijiu in the fortified group had better flavor characteristics.

Liquid state fermentation is now a commonly used route to obtain triterpenoids from Antrodia cinnamomea, and linolenic acid can significantly promote triterpenoids synthesis, whereas its action mechanism has not been studied. Here, we comprehensively performed an investigation on the mechanism of linolenic acid to promote triterpenoids production in liquid-state fermentation of A. cinnamomea. Results showed that the addition of linolenic acid increased the unsaturated fatty acid index, fluidity, and permeability in the cell membrane of A. cinnamomea mycelia, favored the absorption of nutrients in the medium by the mycelium, enhanced the material exchange inside and outside, and thus promoted mycelial growth and triterpenoids synthesis. Moreover, 767 significantly differentially expressed genes were detected by adding linolenic acid, including 212 upregulated genes and 555 downregulated genes. The upregulated genes were mainly enriched in metabolism, glycolytic pathway, TCA cycle, and pyruvate metabolism. It was seen that the addition of linolenic acid improved the cell metabolic activity and promoted the synthesis of secondary metabolites, proving that the addition of linolenic acid improved the metabolic viability of cells and promoted secondary metabolite synthesis.

The present study explores the infusion of active compounds (ascorbic acid and calcium lactate) into sliced button mushrooms (Agaricus bisporus) to increase the nutritional value and reduce the browning effect of sliced mushrooms using the vacuum impregnation (VI) technique. The aim was to functionalize the vacuum-infused sliced mushrooms and evaluate the physicochemical properties of button mushrooms for diversifying food use. The central composite design was implemented to determine the optimized condition for the process with four independent factors, that is, immersion time (IT) 30-90 min, solution temperature (ST) 35-55°C, solution concentration (SC) 4%-12%, and vacuum pressure (VP) 50-170 mbar. The optimum VI processes obtained were ST-40°C, SC-8%, VP-140 mbar, and IT-65 min with a desirability function of 0.77. Statistically, two models (response surface methodology [RSM] and artificial neural network [ANN]) were employed to compare the better performance for the prediction of VI operational process parameters. The RSM model showed a better prediction of VI process parameters than the ANN model, with a higher R² value (0.9228 vs. 0.8160) and lower root mean square error value (1.4004 vs. 2.1751), χ² (2.4491 vs. 5.2762), mean absolute error (1.1177 vs. 1.1611), and absolute average deviation (4.3532 vs. 5.6746) for water loss. A similar pattern was observed for solute gain, ascorbic acid, titratable acidity, color change, firmness, and pH. Therefore, the VI process was found to be an effective method for enhancing the nutritional properties of sliced mushrooms. These findings concluded that the RSM model is more efficient for better prediction with good accuracy of the VI process than the ANN model.