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environmental and economic benefits and risks of food crops and animals on a
wider range of social, cultural, and ethical values (Stewart 2009). Many initiatives
to sensitize people on the ecological liability of animal rearing and to escalate their
interest in alternative proteins, is to be carried before inducting into the food cycle.
There is already the first information on obtaining rapeseed protein by new, innovative methods. NapiFeryn BioTech paves the way in Poland and around the world. It
implements it as part of a grant from the largest EU program financing research and
development, Horizon 2020. However, scientists are measuring much higher and
want to build in Poland the world’s first biorefinery producing rapeseed protein. The
protein from this plant will be differentiated by the method of obtaining from soy
protein. The technology of obtaining soy protein is quite outdated (it comes from
the 1940s). In addition, hexane, a solvent still widely used in the oil industry, is used
for soybean processing. The new technology for obtaining protein from winter oilseed rape will not be based on it, and on very mild biomass processing methods – it
will be a “delicate” process, without drastic changes in pH and without any solvents. It is a more modern solution, safer and giving a higher quality product. In
addition, the conditions under which rapeseed protein is isolated do not damage it
(protein denaturation). Thanks to this, the protein obtained by the innovative
method, in Poland, will be natural and functional. The use of vegetable protein is of
civilized importance – now animals are fed plants to produce protein. The authors
of this project want to direct the protein to people. Animals are a kind of filter
through which most of the protein is lost, i.e. they are an ineffective source of its
processing. Not counting that 4 kg of plants are needed for 1 kg of pork and 1 kg of
beef for 7 kg of plants. Instead of wasting calories, it is worth turning to the protein
obtained from plants, in this case from rape, which is characterized by a high content of full-value proteins (Voisin et al. 2014; Anonymous 2018b). The protein is
obtained from the remains of the oilseed rape oil, the seeds of which contain about
20% of protein with high nutritional values, but until now it has not been used as a
food ingredient. Meanwhile, innovative Polish technology allows the recovery of
about half of this protein in the form of an isolate with high qualitative and functional parameters. An innovative element of this technology is that the starting
material is biomass, which is formed after extrusion of oil from rape seeds. Until
now, the potential of this biomass was not fully used, it served only as animal feed,
because there were no solutions that would isolate the protein for edible purposes
from this biomass. New technology is able to do this, and it makes it unique in the
world (Reckling et al. 2016; Anonymous 2018b).
7.3.11 Protein Diet
Determining the protein requirement is difficult because it is metabolized with
other nutrients. In addition, there is a need to supply with food the right amount
of essential amino acids, which the human body does not synthesize. Plant proteins are usually more difficult to digest than animal proteins due to their high
7 Alternative and New Protein Sources
environmental and economic benefits and risks of food crops and animals on a
wider range of social, cultural, and ethical values (Stewart 2009). Many initiatives
to sensitize people on the ecological liability of animal rearing and to escalate their
interest in alternative proteins, is to be carried before inducting into the food cycle.
There is already the first information on obtaining rapeseed protein by new, innovative methods. NapiFeryn BioTech paves the way in Poland and around the world. It
implements it as part of a grant from the largest EU program financing research and
development, Horizon 2020. However, scientists are measuring much higher and
want to build in Poland the world’s first biorefinery producing rapeseed protein. The
protein from this plant will be differentiated by the method of obtaining from soy
protein. The technology of obtaining soy protein is quite outdated (it comes from
the 1940s). In addition, hexane, a solvent still widely used in the oil industry, is used
for soybean processing. The new technology for obtaining protein from winter oilseed rape will not be based on it, and on very mild biomass processing methods – it
will be a “delicate” process, without drastic changes in pH and without any solvents. It is a more modern solution, safer and giving a higher quality product. In
addition, the conditions under which rapeseed protein is isolated do not damage it
(protein denaturation). Thanks to this, the protein obtained by the innovative
method, in Poland, will be natural and functional. The use of vegetable protein is of
civilized importance – now animals are fed plants to produce protein. The authors
of this project want to direct the protein to people. Animals are a kind of filter
through which most of the protein is lost, i.e. they are an ineffective source of its
processing. Not counting that 4 kg of plants are needed for 1 kg of pork and 1 kg of
beef for 7 kg of plants. Instead of wasting calories, it is worth turning to the protein
obtained from plants, in this case from rape, which is characterized by a high content of full-value proteins (Voisin et al. 2014; Anonymous 2018b). The protein is
obtained from the remains of the oilseed rape oil, the seeds of which contain about
20% of protein with high nutritional values, but until now it has not been used as a
food ingredient. Meanwhile, innovative Polish technology allows the recovery of
about half of this protein in the form of an isolate with high qualitative and functional parameters. An innovative element of this technology is that the starting
material is biomass, which is formed after extrusion of oil from rape seeds. Until
now, the potential of this biomass was not fully used, it served only as animal feed,
because there were no solutions that would isolate the protein for edible purposes
from this biomass. New technology is able to do this, and it makes it unique in the
world (Reckling et al. 2016; Anonymous 2018b).
7.3.11 Protein Diet
Determining the protein requirement is difficult because it is metabolized with
other nutrients. In addition, there is a need to supply with food the right amount
of essential amino acids, which the human body does not synthesize. Plant proteins are usually more difficult to digest than animal proteins due to their high
7 Alternative and New Protein Sources