Development of gel-like, high encapsulation efficiency and antibacterial cinnamaldehyde-loaded Pickering emulsion stabilized by EGCG enhanced whey protein isolate-gum arabic ternary nanocomplex

Pickering emulsions (PEs) loaded with essential oils have proven to be a promising delivery system in food preservation, thus attracting increasing research attention. In this study, epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) enhanced whey protein isolate(WPI)-gum Arabic(GA) ternary spherical nanocomplex (WGE) was fabricated by thermal and pH double-induced method and used to stabilize antibacterial, antioxidant and sustained release Pickering emulsions loaded with cinnamaldehyde. The WGE nanocomplex exhibited biphasic surface wettability (78.2±2.8°), 1.73 times that of WPI, as well as outstanding interfacial tension (5.60 mN/m), 44.6 % lower than that of WPI-GA, mainly due to the electrostatic interactions between WPI and GA and enhanced surface hydrophobicity causing by EGCG, indicating its superb ability to stabilize Pickering emulsions. Using WGE nanocomplex as the Pickering emulsion stabilizer, PEs template was constructed. Confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) showed the formation of a dense oil-water interface layer and gel-like network structure, which demonstrated good storage stability against creaming and coalescence, benefiting to cinnamaldehyde encapsulation. Finally, cinnamaldehyde was encapsulated effectively using this PEs pattern with high encapsulation efficiency under different conditions. The cinnamaldehyde Pickering emulsions (CPEs) demonstrated superior antioxidant ability against DPPH (>85 %) and ABTS (>78 %), as well as effective antibacterial capability against E. coli (>99.9999 %) and S. aureus (>99.99 %) than pure cinnamaldehyde. Moreover, CPEs showed slow sustained-release ability, which could satisfyingly prolong the biological activity of cinnamaldehyde. Therefore, the WGE stabilized cinnamaldehyde Pickering emulsions fabricated in this work might provide a promising alternative for the delivery of antibacterial and controlled release essential oils in the food industry.