205
While having important functional properties, β-glucan can also be very useful
as a nutraceutical supplement. Being versatile, natural and widely available,
β-glucan can be used in a variety of food products imparting health-promoting properties to staple foods, thus meeting the demands of today’s health conscious
consumer.
Conclusion
Enormous advances have been made in studying the mechanisms governing the
physiological effects of dietary gums. While the road ahead may seem long, it looks
very promising. Dietary gums have gained high importance due to their great structural versatility, high water-affinity and easy processing, which facilitates its wide
spread application in food and pharmaceutical industries. Further, polysaccharide
gums are very promising ingredients and play a key role in designing of food with
high satiating capacity. Ample studies have been conducted on the determining the
benefits of dietary interventions with soluble gum rich foods. In the last decade
alone, numerous efforts have been made to use gums in encapsulation technology as
new instrumental imaging techniques are available, making it possible to understand their action in vivo. However, more research is needed to develop gastrointestinal models simulating different gut areas to allow evaluation of the intestinal
absorption of food ingredients and validate them in vitro in order to extrapolate the
results to real, in vivo situations.
References
Abad, L. V. (2010). Radiolysis studies of kappa carrageenan for bio based materials development.
(Thesis). Department of Nuclear Engineering and Management, University of Tokyo.
Ahmad, A., Munir, B., Muhammad, A., Shaukat, B., Muhammad, A., & Tahira, T. (2012).
Perspective of β-glucan as functional ingredient for food industry. Journal of Nutrition & Food
Sciences, 2(2), 133–139.
Ahmed, Z., Wang, Y., Anjum, N., Ahmad, A., & Khan, S. T. (2013). Characterization of exopolysaccharide produced by Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens ZW3 isolated from Tibet kefir—Part
II. Food Hydrocolloids, 30(1), 343–350.
Aida, F. M. N. A., Shuhaimi, M., Yazid, M., & Maaruf, A. G. (2009). Mushroom as a potential
source of prebiotics: A review. Trends in Food Science and Technology, 20(11–12), 567–575.
Battaerd, H. A., & Tregear, G. W. (1967). Graft copolymers (Vol. 16). New York, NY: Interscience
Publishers.
Betancur-Ancona, D., Pacheco-Aguirre, J., Castellanos-Ruelas, A., & Chel-Guerrero, L. (2011).
Microencapsulation of papain using carboxymethylated flamboyant (Delonixregia) seed gum.
Innovative Food Science and Emerging Technologies, 12(1), 67–72.
Bhardwaj, T. R., Kanwar, M., Lal, R., & Gupta, A. (2000). Natural gums and modified natural gums as sustained-release carriers. Drug Development and Industrial Pharmacy, 26(10),
1025–1038.
Dietary Gums
While having important functional properties, β-glucan can also be very useful
as a nutraceutical supplement. Being versatile, natural and widely available,
β-glucan can be used in a variety of food products imparting health-promoting properties to staple foods, thus meeting the demands of today’s health conscious
consumer.
Conclusion
Enormous advances have been made in studying the mechanisms governing the
physiological effects of dietary gums. While the road ahead may seem long, it looks
very promising. Dietary gums have gained high importance due to their great structural versatility, high water-affinity and easy processing, which facilitates its wide
spread application in food and pharmaceutical industries. Further, polysaccharide
gums are very promising ingredients and play a key role in designing of food with
high satiating capacity. Ample studies have been conducted on the determining the
benefits of dietary interventions with soluble gum rich foods. In the last decade
alone, numerous efforts have been made to use gums in encapsulation technology as
new instrumental imaging techniques are available, making it possible to understand their action in vivo. However, more research is needed to develop gastrointestinal models simulating different gut areas to allow evaluation of the intestinal
absorption of food ingredients and validate them in vitro in order to extrapolate the
results to real, in vivo situations.
References
Abad, L. V. (2010). Radiolysis studies of kappa carrageenan for bio based materials development.
(Thesis). Department of Nuclear Engineering and Management, University of Tokyo.
Ahmad, A., Munir, B., Muhammad, A., Shaukat, B., Muhammad, A., & Tahira, T. (2012).
Perspective of β-glucan as functional ingredient for food industry. Journal of Nutrition & Food
Sciences, 2(2), 133–139.
Ahmed, Z., Wang, Y., Anjum, N., Ahmad, A., & Khan, S. T. (2013). Characterization of exopolysaccharide produced by Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens ZW3 isolated from Tibet kefir—Part
II. Food Hydrocolloids, 30(1), 343–350.
Aida, F. M. N. A., Shuhaimi, M., Yazid, M., & Maaruf, A. G. (2009). Mushroom as a potential
source of prebiotics: A review. Trends in Food Science and Technology, 20(11–12), 567–575.
Battaerd, H. A., & Tregear, G. W. (1967). Graft copolymers (Vol. 16). New York, NY: Interscience
Publishers.
Betancur-Ancona, D., Pacheco-Aguirre, J., Castellanos-Ruelas, A., & Chel-Guerrero, L. (2011).
Microencapsulation of papain using carboxymethylated flamboyant (Delonixregia) seed gum.
Innovative Food Science and Emerging Technologies, 12(1), 67–72.
Bhardwaj, T. R., Kanwar, M., Lal, R., & Gupta, A. (2000). Natural gums and modified natural gums as sustained-release carriers. Drug Development and Industrial Pharmacy, 26(10),
1025–1038.
Dietary Gums