Research Projects

The interest in producing functional foods containing encapsulated probiotic bacteria has grown in recent years. Probiotics are incorporated into dairy products like cheese, yogurt, and ice cream due to their perceived health benefits. However, dairy products can cause allergies and have drawbacks like lactose intolerance and cholesterol content. Some non-dairy probiotic beverages are being commercialized. Nutraceuticals are another important vector for probiotics, with capsule or tablet forms developed by companies. Prebiotics like inulin and oligosaccharides are becoming increasingly important as functional food ingredients, as they can manipulate the composition of colonic microbiota in the human gut and improve host health. Mushrooms have been studied extensively as a product with applications in both food and pharmaceutical industries. Many of the mushroom polysaccharides belong to β-glucans, making them ideal candidates for prebiotics and carriers for probiotic bacteria. The importance of synbiotic products, which combine prebiotics and probiotics, has gained attention. The main objective of this proposal is to develop synbiotic microcapsules using mushroom extract as prebiotics and probiotic carriers. This innovative non-dairy-based probiotic product combines the nutritional and therapeutic properties of probiotic bacteria and mushrooms, making it a valuable nutraceutical and therapeutic product.

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