Trends in lactose-derived bioactives: synthesis and purification

Abstract

Lactose obtained from cheese whey is a low value commodity despite its great potential as raw material for the production of bioactive compounds. Among them, prebiotics stand out as valuable ingredients to be added to food matrices to build up functional foods, which currently represent the most active sector within the food industry. Functional foods market has been growing steadily in the recent decades along with the increasing awareness of the World population about healthy nutrition, and this is having a strong impact on lactose-derived bioactives. Most of them are produced by enzyme biocatalysis because of molecular precision and environmental sustainability considerations. The current status and outlook of the production of lactose-derived bioactive compounds is presented with special emphasis on downstream operations which are critical because of the rather modest lactose conversion and product yields that are attainable. Even though some of these products have already an established market, there are still several challenges referring to the need of developing better catalysts and more cost-effective downstream operations for delivering high quality products at affordable prices. This technological push is expected to broaden the spectrum of lactose-derived bioactive compounds to be produced at industrial scale in the near future.

From Lactose to Alkyl Galactoside Fatty Acid Esters as Non‐Ionic Biosurfactants: A Two‐Step Enzymatic Approach to Cheese Whey Valorization

“…glucose and galactose that can be both obtained by β‐galactosidase‐mediated hydrolysis of lactose [42] . Recently, due to the lactose price fluctuation, the demand for manufacturing monosaccharides and other “lactose‐derived bioactives” from inexpensive whey permeate is growing [28] . Specifically, galactose can be isolated directly from whey permeate after protein removal, lactose enzymatic hydrolysis and several purification steps, including activated carbon treatment, electrodialysis, ion purification and simulated moving bed chromatography [43]…”

“…[42] Recently, due to the lactose price fluctuation, the demand for manufacturing monosaccharides and other "lactose-derived bioactives" from inexpensive whey permeate is growing. [28] Specifically, galactose can be isolated directly from whey permeate after protein removal, lactose enzymatic hydrolysis and several purification steps, including activated carbon treatment, electrodialysis, ion purification and simulated moving bed chromatography. [43] Following the already established strategy to synthesize sugar-based surfactants, [10] namely the preparation of sugar derivatives apolar enough to allow the successive solvent-free enzymatic esterification, D-(+)-galactose (2) was submitted to Fischer glycosylation reactions with the selected naturally occurring alcohols (3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9).…”

“…[27] Following this strategy, lactose can be converted into valuable chemicals, such as prebiotics and sweeteners (i. e. galactooligosaccharides, lactulose, lactosucrose, and galactosylpolyhydroxyalcohols). [28] The transglycosylation of lactose here reported was carried out according to the method described by Ahumada [24] which was extended, with some modifications, to the preparation of the library of alkyl β-Dgalactopyranosides 10 b-16 b (Scheme 1a and Table 1).…”

Nondairy food applications of whey and milk permeates: Direct and indirect uses

“…As there are already a number of reviews published detailing the various lactose‐derived nutraceuticals (e.g., GOS, lactulose, epilactose, etc.) and value‐added ingredients that can be produced from various dairy waste streams (Chourasia et al., 2022; Lappa et al., 2019; Nath et al., 2016; Vera et al., 2022), these applications will only be discussed briefly, and will focus on milk or WP as the substrate. A table summarizing the key points presented below is included as Supporting Information (Table S2).…”

Immobilization of Lactobacillus acidophilus β-galactosidase on chitosan obtained from the shells of the African giant snail, Achatina achatina

“…In addition, GOS, by suppressing the expression of bacterial quorum-sensing (QS) genes, could prevent the growth and production of biofilms by some possible harmful enteric bacteria. [10][11][12][13] Industrial β-galactosidases are usually sourced from microorganisms, especially fungi, bacteria, and yeasts. 8,9,14 Although many bacteria produce β-galactosidases, major β-galactosidase production has majorly focused on the use of some Lactobacillus species of the Lactic acid bacteria (LBA) with the "Generally Regarded As Safe (GRAS)" status.…”