Nutraceutical potential of fermented foods under investigation

A new European funded research project, involving a consortium of European academic institutions, is dedicated to improving the nutraceutical knowledge of fermented food products and will spend four years seeking to improve the health benefit of such food products.

Called Nutra Cells, the project is co-ordinated by NIZO food research institute in the Netherlands. Researchers involved in the project expect their research to lead to a vast improvement in the health-status of the food products by either the production or addition of components such as low-calorie-sugars, oligosaccharides or B-type vitamins, or by the removal of undesirable food components such as lactose, galactose and raffinose.

. The nutraceuticals will be produced by lactic acid bacteria, propionic acid bacteria and bifidobacteria, all with a secure record of safe use in the food industry. The nutraceutical-generating activity will be enhanced in these food-grade micro-organisms either by selection of optimal strains and fermentation conditions or by food-grade modification of metabolism in these strains. These two lines of research will result in both short term product development with natural strains and long term application with highly-productive engineered strains.

Researchers noted in a statement that the involvement of industrial partners in the area of dairy, nutritional foods and starter production should ensure the dissemination of the scientific results in a broad range of food (and pharma) applications.

Developments on this project can be followed on the project website​.