No abstract

In recent years, mainly due to the specific health benefits associated with (1) the discovery of bioactive peptides in protein hydrolysates, (2) the reduction of protein allergenicity by protein hydrolysis, and (3) the improved protein digestibility and absorption of protein hydrolysates, the utilization of protein hydrolysates in functional foods and beverages has significantly increased. Although the specific health benefits from different hydrolysates are somewhat proven, the delivery and/or stability of these benefits is debatable during distribution, storage, and consumption. In this review, we discuss (1) the quality changes in different food protein hydrolysates during storage; (2) the resulting changes in the structure and texture of three food matrices, i.e., low moisture foods (LMF, aw < 0.6), intermediate moisture foods (IMF, 0.6 ≤ aw < 0.85), and high moisture foods (HMF, aw ≥ 0.85); and (3) the potential solutions to improve storage stability of food protein hydrolysates. In addition, we note there is a great need for evaluation of biofunction availability of bioactive peptides in food protein hydrolysates during storage.

Our study suggests a cardioprotective role for PON2 in both experimental and human heart failure, which may be associated with the ability of PON2 to improve mitochondrial function and diminish ROS generation.

Inherited cardiomyopathies including hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), dilated cardiomyopathies (DCM), arrythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC), and other inherited forms of heart failure represent a unique set of genetically defined cardiovascular disease processes. Unraveling the molecular mechanisms of these deadly forms of human heart disease has been challenging, however recent groundbreaking scientific advances in stem cell technology has allowed for the generation of patient-specific human inducible stem cell (hiPSC)-derived cardiomyocytes (hiPSC-derived CMs). hiPSC-derived CMs retain the genetic blueprint of the patient, they can be maintained in culture, and they recapitulate the phenotypic characteristics of the disease in vitro, thus serving as a disease in a dish. This review provides an overview of in vitro modeling of inherited cardiomyopathies using patient-specific hiPSC-derived CMs.