Food Science Program, Division of Food, Nutrition and Exercise Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri, USA.
Hubei Key Laboratory of Agricultural Bioinformatics, College of Informatics, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China.
Compr Rev Food Sci Food Saf. 2024 Jan;23(1):e13261. doi: 10.1111/1541-4337.13261.
Proteins are essential to human health with enormous food applications. Despite their advantages, plant and animal proteins often exhibit limited molecular flexibility and poor solubility due to hydrogen bonds, hydrophobic interactions, and ionic interactions within their molecular structures. Thus, there is an urgent need to modify the rigid structure of proteins to enhance their stability and functional properties. Ultrasound-assisted ionic liquid (UA-IL) treatment for developing compound modification and producing proteins with excellent functional properties has received interest. However, no review specifically addresses the interactions between UA-ILs and proteins. Hence, this review focused on recent research advancements concerning the effects and potential reaction mechanisms of UA-ILs on the physicochemical properties (including particle size; primary, secondary, and tertiary structure; and surface morphology) as well as the functionality (such as solubility, emulsifying properties, and foaming ability) of proteins. Moreover, the safety evaluation of modified proteins was also discussed from various perspectives, such as acute and chronic toxicity, genotoxicity, cytotoxicity, and environmental and microbial toxicity. This review demonstrated that UA-IL treatment-induced protein structural changes significantly impact the functional characteristics of proteins. This treatment approach efficiently promotes protein structure stretching and spatial rearrangement through cavitation, thermal effects, and ionic interactions. As a result, the functional properties of modified proteins exhibited an obvious enhancement, thereby bringing more opportunities to utilize modified protein products in the food industry. Potential future directions for protein modification using UA-ILs were also proposed.
蛋白质对人类健康至关重要，在食品领域有广泛的应用。尽管具有诸多优势，但动植物蛋白的分子结构中存在氢键、疏水相互作用和离子相互作用，导致其分子灵活性有限，溶解度较差。因此，急需对蛋白质的刚性结构进行修饰，以提高其稳定性和功能特性。超声辅助离子液体（UA-IL）处理技术在开发复合改性和生产具有优异功能特性的蛋白质方面引起了关注。然而，目前尚无专门针对 UA-IL 与蛋白质之间相互作用的综述。因此，本综述重点介绍了 UA-IL 对蛋白质物理化学性质（包括粒径、一级、二级和三级结构以及表面形态）以及功能特性（如溶解度、乳化性能和起泡能力）的影响和潜在反应机制的最新研究进展。此外，还从急性和慢性毒性、遗传毒性、细胞毒性以及环境和微生物毒性等多个角度讨论了改性蛋白的安全性评价。本综述表明，UA-IL 处理诱导的蛋白质结构变化显著影响蛋白质的功能特性。这种处理方法通过空化、热效应和离子相互作用，有效地促进蛋白质结构的拉伸和空间重排。因此，改性蛋白的功能特性得到明显增强，从而为食品工业中改性蛋白产品的应用带来更多机会。还提出了使用 UA-IL 进行蛋白质改性的潜在未来方向。
