Exploring protein derivative profiles in cheese whey through native Candida tropicalis fermentation

Abstract

ABSTRACT Native yeasts produce most peptides and amino acids from cheese whey fermentation. The research aimed to determine the protein, peptides, and amino acid profiles regarding whey fermentation by spontaneous fermentation and re-inoculation by native yeasts as a basis for determining potential yeasts in amino acid production. The selected native yeasts were identified through genome-based analysis on the DNA base sequence of the Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) region. The molecular identification shows that isolate CT1 is 95.62% comparable to Candida tropicalis strain VIT-NN02, CT2 is 98.85% same to stain NB5Y, and CT3 is 99.42% similar to GT 6. Whey fermentation was conducted by inoculating 3% each native C. tropicalis and without inoculation for spontaneous fermentation, then incubated for 48 hours at ambient temperature (26 ± 2°C). Unlike the other samples, the spontaneously fermented mozzarella whey was incubated without inoculation after cheese separation. After 48 hours, fermented whey was kept at 4°C for examination. The Kjeldahl method evaluated protein concentration, Folin-Ciocalteau determined peptide levels, and HPLC determined amino acid composition. C.tropicalis was identified as cheese whey native yeasts, and all treatments decreased protein and peptides while increased the total amino acid includes every single amino acid value except histidine during isolate CT1 whey fermentation. Candida tropicalis CT2 shown as potential isolate for the amino acid production from whey, with the protein contents of 0.846 ± 0.151%, protein decreases of 0.384 ± 0.186, peptide levels of 264.75 ± 40.40ppm, peptide decreases of 99.87 ± 37.96 and the highest total amino acid of 6149.56ppm.