Angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE), playing a crucial role in the renin angiotensin aldosterone system, is well-known to catalyze the conversion of the decapeptide angiotensin I into the physiologically active octapeptide angiotensin II, triggering blood pressure increasing mechanisms. To meet the demand for natural phytochemicals as antihypertensive agents in functional food development, extracts prepared from a series of vegetables were screened for their ACE-inhibitory activity by means of a LC-MS/MS-based in vitro assay. By far the highest ACE inhibition was found for a lettuce extract, in which the most active compound was located by means of activity-guided fractionation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFor the first time, quantitative LC-MS/MS profiling of 56 hop-derived sensometabolites contributing to the bitter taste of beer revealed a comprehensive insight into the transformation of individual bitter compounds during storage of beer. The proton-catalyzed cyclization of trans-iso-α-acids was identified to be the quantitatively predominant reaction leading to lingering, harsh bitter tasting tri- and tetracyclic compounds such as, e.g.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAlthough the complex taste profile of beer is well accepted to be reflected by the molecular blueprint of its sensometabolites, the knowledge available on the process-induced transformation of hop-derived phytochemicals into key sensometabolites during beer manufacturing is far from comprehensive. The objective of the present investigation was, therefore, to develop and apply a suitable HPLC-MS/MS method for the simultaneous and comprehensive quantitative monitoring of a total of 69 hop-derived sensometabolites in selected intermediary products throughout a full-scale beer manufacturing process. After data normalization, the individual sensometabolites were arranged into different clusters by means of agglomerative hierarchical analysis and visualized using a sensomics heatmap to verify the structure-specific reaction routes proposed for their formation during the beer brewing process.
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