Food-protein enzymatic hydrolysates possess both antimicrobial and immunostimulatory activities: a "cause and effect" theory of bifunctionality.

The antimicrobial activity (the ability to activate the microbial autolytic system) and immunostimulatory activity (the ability to improve the phagocytic cell functioning) of 20 food-protein hydrolysates [five food proteins (casein, alpha-lactalbumin, beta-lactoglobulin, ovalbumin and serum albumin) hydrolyzed with four gastrointestinal proteinases (trypsin, alpha-chymotrypsin, pepsin and pancreatin)] were examined. All the food-protein hydrolysates acted antimicrobially in vitro towards all 24 microbial strains tested: autolysis of 20 naturally autolyzing strains was activated, with the autolysis activation index (K(A)) ranging from 1.04 to 22.

Oral tryptic casein hydrolysate enhances phagocytosis by mouse peritoneal and blood phagocytic cells but fails to prevent induced inflammation.

Mouse experiments were conducted in order to find whether oral application of tryptic casein hydrolysate (TCH) results in enhancement of phagocytosing capacity of murine phagocytic cells as well as whether such application might be of use for prevention of inflammatory processes. Phagocytosing capacity of phagocytic cells of mice that received oral TCH once daily in a dose of 1.0 mg/g body weight dissolved in 0.