Abstract
Xuanwei ham is especially rich in a large amount of peptides and free amino acids under the action of protein degradation. Some of these peptides can potentially exert bioactivities of interest for human health. Traditionally, Xuanwei ham should undergo Chinese household cooking treatments before eating. However, it has not been known how its bioactivity changes after cooking and gastrointestinal digestion. Herein, Xuanwei ham is analysed before and after cooking, as well as gastrointestinal digestion being simulated so as to evaluate and compare its effect on antioxidant and angiotensin I-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitory activities. The antioxidant activity is analysed using five different methods, and results demonstrate that cooking has some negative effects on antioxidative capacity when determined using different antioxidant methods except for a significant increment in 1,1'-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl radical-scavenging activity, while ACE inhibitory activity increases significantly after cooking compared with control samples. After gastrointestinal digestion of samples, there is a significant increment of the antioxidant and ACE inhibitory activities in comparison with control and cooked samples. Particularly, after gastrointestinal digestion, free thiols content and 2,2'-azino-bis(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) radical-cation-scavenging activity of Xuanwei ham, respectively, increase about twice and fourfold, while ACE inhibitory activity increases about twice compared to cooked samples, reaching the value of 83.73%. Therefore, through cooking the antioxidant activity and ACE inhibitory activity of Xuanwei ham are not completely lost and a part of them is still maintained, while gastrointestinal digestion produces a significant enhancement in both bioactivities, highlighting a greater potential for a beneficial physiological effect on human health after eating it.
Highlights
Protein in the diet has been considered to be responsible for cellular maintenance, growth and energy
It have been reported that hydrophobic amino acid like Val or Leu exposed in peptide sequences could improve the presence of the peptides at the water–lipid interface, promoting access for the scavenging of free radicals formed in the lipid [38]
The results showed that Xuanwei ham was a good source of peptides of high nutritional quality with antioxidant activity and Angiotensin I-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitory activity
Summary
Protein in the diet has been considered to be responsible for cellular maintenance, growth and energy. Compared to vegetables and cereals, meat is still one of the more important sources of high-quality protein, essential amino acids and many essential micronutrients in the diet [1]. Dietary proteins have been considered to be potential food for providing bioactive peptides [2], which have been identified from a range of foods, including milk and meat sources such as beef, chicken, pork and fish muscle proteins [3,4]. The most studied mechanism underlying the antihypertensive effects of peptides is inhibition of angiotensin-converting enzyme [16,17]. Angiotensin I-converting enzyme (ACE) is an enzyme of effect in blood pressure regulation through two different reactions of the renin–angiotensin–aldosterone system. Moderate hypertension can be controlled by a nutritional approach and numerous studies have documented antihypertensive and ACE inhibitory effects of different food sources [19,20,21]
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