23 Nov, 2021

By Chen Zhixian

Protein, one of the main nutrient substances, has been seen a booming demand as the population increases and living standards improve. From the 1960s to this century, the global per capita and annual demand for both plant and animal proteins has been increased significantly. By 2050, the world's population is expected to grow to 9.7 billion, two-thirds of whom will live in urban areas. A huge "protein gap" is expected to be formed in following 30 years for population growth and rapid changes in eating habits. Therefore, the development of novel sources of proteins, such as proteins extracted from algae, yeast and other single-celled organisms, is of strategic importance. This kind of proteins has a broad market prospect in the application of food industry for its high production efficiency, wide raw material sources and less labor force needed without limitation of seasons and climates.

AnPro yeast protein is a protein derived from microorganisms with high quality that has been achieved industrial production. Compared to animal and plant proteins, AnPro® has unique characteristics. Its production, for example, produces one-twentieth the carbon emission of animal protein and is free from arable land and climate constraints. At the same time, there is no concerns over virus infection, antibiotic residues, hormones and GMO, so it is undoubtedly an eco-friendly protein. In addition, its nutritional value is also unique.

Comparing of protein production efficiency between different protein sources

Environmental influence and resource consumption when producing equal amount of protein

Nutritional Characteristics of AngeoPro Yeast Protein

1) Contain 9 kinds of amino acids necessary for human body, with reasonable composition

AnPro contains 9 kinds of amino acids necessary for human body (including histidine essential for child growth and development). The AAS (amino acid score) of other amino acids are all higher than 100, except for the sulfur-containing amino acid whose score is slightly lower than the score in the AAS pattern of amino acids essential for human body recommended by FAO/WHO (2007). The total EAAs (essential amino acid) accounts for 47.58% of the total amino acids, and the ratio of EAAs to NEAAs (non-essential amino acid) reaches 0.91, which meet the standards of 40% and 0.6 stipulated by FAO/WHO, and are higher than those of soybean protein and close to those of whey protein.

2) High content of BCAAs (branched chain amino acid) and some special NEAAs

The content of BCAAs (leucine, isoleucine and valine) in AnPro is about 22~23%. BCAAs participate in skeletal muscle energy metabolism, and help to improve exercise ability and delay fatigue, promote protein anabolism in the recovery period after work-out, accelerate muscle synthesis and reduce the decomposition of muscle tissue, as well as contribute to the enlargement of muscle mass, which are suitable for sports people.

The content of arginine is about 7% in AnPro. Although arginine is a NEAA for the body, it plays an important role in muscle development and recovery as an inherent signal of growth hormone release. Arginine is also known to regulate blood flow to increase blood flow in muscles and provide more amino acids to muscles.

Lysine, which is low in cereals, is abundant in AnPro(about 11.1%). Lysine has positive nutritional significance in promoting human growth and development, enhancing body immunity, anti-virus, promoting fat oxidation, and relieving anxiety.

3) A "sustained-release protein", with relatively slow digestibility

AnPro is a typical "slow protein", also known as sustained-release protein, which is slowly absorbed but provides a slow and continuous supply of amino acids to the body, inhibiting the decomposition of proteins consumed by muscles. The principle of slow digestion of yeast protein is that it contains a certain amount of immune polysaccharide, yeast β-glucan. Yeast β-glucan may temporarily bind to protease in gastric juice and intestinal juice to form a complex, which delays the decomposition of yeast protein to a certain extent.

It's important to note that AnPro is relatively slow to digest, but that doesn't mean it has a low digestibility. Studies have shown that the total digestibility of AnPro is similar to that of soy protein and slightly lower than that of whey protein, but there is no significant difference in the absorbability of the three.

Application of AnPro Yeast Protein in Food

1) Sports Nutrition Food

For sports people, it is important to supplement enough protein, but when to supplement protein, what kind of protein and its hydrolysates are more important.

Protein with high digestion rate can promote synthesis of protein, and protein with low digestion rate can reduce the hydrolysis efficiency of protein. Whey protein is a protein with a high digestion rate, which can lead to the rapid appearance and increase of amino acids. Compared with the intake of soybean protein or casein alone, the intake of whey protein after exercise has a more obvious effect on promoting the synthesis of muscle. However, the increase time of amino acids caused by whey protein is very short. The release concentration of essential amino acids in peripheral blood can reach the maximum after 30 minutes of the intake of whey protein, but it will return to a quiet state after 3 hours. The supplement of yeast protein with a slow digestion rate can not promote protein oxidation and synthesis in a short time, but can inhibit protein decomposition. After exercise, if you can ingest mixed proteins containing multiple digestion rates, you can shorten the muscle protein synthesis time in the whole recovery period after exercise, which is conducive to muscle recovery. Especially in endurance sports, the energy supply ratio of protein will increase with the consumption of muscle glycogen in the body, and protein catabolism will be strengthened. Sufficient protein can prevent central fatigue. During exercise, protein synthesis and catabolism are in dynamic changes, the concentration of insulin and testosterone in blood decreases, protein catabolism increases, and supplementing proteins with a slow digestion rate (such as AnPro) is especially necessary.

2) Nutritional food for the elderly

In the process of human body from maturity to aging, the function and performance of neuromuscular system decline significantly. Its characteristic is that even healthy elderly people will inevitably suffer from the decline of skeletal muscle quality and muscle strength. The most common causes are aging, tumor and malnutrition, among which aging is the most important. Loss of muscle mass caused by aging and reduced physical activities.

Animal experiments show that AnPro can increase the muscle fiber density of quadriceps femoris of elderly rats and narrow the gap between muscle fibers. The increased muscle fibers were mainly slow muscle fibers. Slow muscle fiber has slow contraction speed, small strength, long duration, not easy to fatigue, high aerobic capacity and large content of mitochondrion; the corresponding fast muscle fiber has fast contraction speed, great strength, short duration, easy fatigue and high anaerobic capacity. In addition to the amino acids provided by yeast protein, this effect is also related to its ability to regulate the diversity of intestinal flora. Therefore, yeast protein - AnPro also shows a good application prospect in nutritional food for the elderly.

3) Artificial meat

In recent years, with the rise of vegetarianism and environmentalism, "artificial meat" boasting high protein, low fat, low cholesterol, energy conservation and environmental protection is quietly entering people's lives and has become a synonym for healthy and environmentally friendly food in many people's eyes. There are more than 400 million vegetarians in the world, which has laid a certain foundation for the artificial meat market, and the crisis of meat shortage is also promoting the continuous development of the plant meat industry.

Yeast protein replaces part of plant protein in the production of artificial meat. On the one hand, protein amino acids from different sources can learn from each other and complement each other; on the other hand, yeast protein can also inhibit beany flavor. Animal experiments also proved that the efficacy ratio of mixture of yeast protein, soybean protein and whey protein was better than any single protein.

The research on the function and application of yeast protein is continuing. It is believed that yeast protein will play a more and more important role in the protein supplement market in the near future.

References:

[1] WHO/FAO/UNU. Protein and amino acid requirements in human nutrition report of a joint WHO/FAO/UNU expert consultation [R]. Geneva: World Health Organization, 2007

[2] Chen Zhixian, Zhang Haibo, Zhang Shuangqing, etc. Research on Amino Acid Composition and In Vitro Dynamic Digestion of Three Proteins from Different Sources [J] Journal of Henan University of Technology: Natural Sciences, 2019 (2):7.

[3] Tang Xiaoqiao, Wu Yu, Fan Jun, etc. Evaluation of Nutritional Quality of Yeast Protein [J]. Journal of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, 2020, 31(6):5.

About Angel Human Health：

Specialized in yeast and fermentation, AHH is committed to developing innovative, differentiated, science-based functional ingredients and customized solutions, to help our customers get enduring success, as well as contribute to a healthier and sustainable world together.

About Angel:

Angel Yeast Company is a high-tech listed company specializing in yeast and biotech. Product business covers Yeast and Baking, Yeast Extract-Savoury, Nutrition & Health and Biotechnology fields. It is one of the world's leading companies in the yeast industry. Angel has 12 holding subsidiaries and provides products and services for more than 150 countries and regions.

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