Abstract
Arthrospira platensis, commercially known as Spirulina, is a fresh-water cyanobacterium that has been gaining increasing attention in recent years due to its high biological and nutritional value. For this reason, it has been employed in several food applications, to obtain or enhance functional and technological properties of cheese, yogurt, bread, cookies or pasta. The aim of this work was to evaluate the potential boosting effect of two different concentrations (0.25% and 0.50% w/v) of A. platensis on the fermentation capability of several starter lactic acid bacteria (LAB) strains, 1 probiotic and 4 commercial mix culture. These strains were used to ferment three different substrates and their fermentation behaviors were evaluated by impedance analyses together with rheological and color measurements. In tryptic soy broth (TSB), the A. platensis boosting effect was significantly higher if compared to yeast extract for all the starter LAB strains except for Lb. casei, which was equally stimulated. Different results were found when the same LAB strains were cultivated in SSM. The most evident boosting effect was found for S. thermophilus and Lb. casei. LAB growth was promoted by A. platensis, confirming that it could be a useful tool in the production of novel functional fermented dairy foods. The potential boosting effect was evaluated on four commercial mix cultures used to produce milk and soy fermented beverages. It was demonstrated that the booster effect took place, but it was variable and dependent not only on the mix culture used, but also on the substrate and A. platensis concentration. Also, rheological and color modifications were found to be dependent on these factors.
Highlights
A. platensis is a fresh-water cyanobacterium that has several biological activities and a great nutritional value, because it contains high levels of proteins, essentials amino acids, vitamins, polyunsaturated fatty acids, minerals, polyphenols, carotenoids and chlorophyll [1]
The encountered variability in the boosting effect of A. platensis was dependent on the compound, be added natural ingredient to produce fermented milkvariability and soy beverages mix culture, can the substrate used,asand on the diverse concentration added
Dependent of the different growth ability and microbial specificity of lactic acid bacteria (LAB) cultures, highlighting that that thisa type of use requires its sterilization, the results obtained in our study take each Considering of them could have specific employment
Summary
A. platensis is a fresh-water cyanobacterium that has several biological activities and a great nutritional value, because it contains high levels of proteins (more than 60% on dry basis), essentials amino acids, vitamins, polyunsaturated fatty acids, minerals, polyphenols, carotenoids and chlorophyll [1]. Due to the presence of the pigment C-phycocyanin, the color of A. platensis is green-blue [2]. This microalga, commercially known as Spirulina, has different industrial applications e.g., as food supplement [3,4], in feed [5], in cosmetics [6] and in health products [7]. In several studies A. platensis has been employed in food formulations in order to obtain or enhance functional and technological properties of cheese [8], yogurt [9,10], soft drink beverages [11], bread, cookies and pasta [12,13,14]. The increasing consumer’s demand of functional and natural food has led
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