Influence of bile salts on the gastrointestinal digestion of agar-casein hybrid systems and the nanoassembly of their digestion products.

This manuscript reports on the effect of different bile salts concentration on the gastrointestinal digestion of casein and casein-agar hybrid systems and evaluates the effect on the nanostructural assembly of the digestion products through the application of advanced small angle X-ray scattering analysis (SAXS). The results showed that bile salts promote the hydrolysis of micellar casein upon in vitro gastrointestinal digestions. It is noteworthy that in the presence of agar, bile salts interact with the polysaccharide, leading to a reduction in their proteolytic activity.

Nanostructural changes in Polysaccharide-Casein Gel-Like structures upon in vitro gastrointestinal digestion.

This work reports on the nanostructural changes taking place during the in vitro gastrointestinal digestion of polysaccharide-casein gel-like structures through the use of small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS). The results indicated that during the gastric phase, the hydrolysis of casein led to a swelling of the micellar structure, yielding peptide clusters. The presence of sulphated polysaccharides such as agar and κ-carrageenan was seen to limit the hydrolysis of casein during the gastric phase, hence decreasing the size of the formed clusters.