Development of a menaquinone-7 enriched functional food

Abstract

There is increasing interest in the development of fortified foods enriched in menaquinone-7 as high dietary intakes may reduce the incidence of osteoporosis and cardiovascular calcification. In this work we explore the potential of using food ingredients as fermentation substrates for the development of such products. It was found that a combination of soy protein and glycerol was the most suitable for MK-7 production. The process was scaled-up; use of a dual feeding strategy was found to avoid foaming and improve MK-7 production. The MK-7 titre and productivity were 99mgL−1 and 2.1mgL−1h−1 respectively, amongst the highest values reported in the open literature. Finally, the resulting product was formulated into a food (soymilk); it was found that 75% of the MK-7 remained after 24 weeks of room temperature storage. These results clearly demonstrate an approach to utilise food ingredients for the production of MK-7 enriched functional foods.