Funded under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP), Mission 4 Component 2 Investment 1.3, Theme 10.
Funded under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP), Mission 4 Component 2 Investment 1.3, Theme 10.
Development of protocols to evaluate the generation and bioaccessibili...
Highlights
MetaOmics and MultiOmics approaches will be used for the identification and quantification of toxic compounds in novel sources or ingredients, also to anticipate risks related to novel foods and new sustainable food processes. The culture collection from task 3.1.1 will be used for challenge experiments in pilot plants mimicking industrial manufacturing. Food toxicants in new ingredients and food processing technologies will be evaluated (in connection with Spoke 2). Allergenicity (also with computational approaches) and toxicity will be considered by in vitro and in vivo tests. Exposure assessment and risk- benefit assessment (RBA) of novel foods will be performed.
RA of food toxicants (M30)
Report on integrated methodologies for RA and RBA of novel foods (M30)
Report on the formation, accumulation, and modification of food toxicants along the food production chain
Over the last years, interest in the identification of new and effective strategies to preserve food health value and prolong the food shelf-life has grown. Many stress tests based on guidelines reported by ICH, WHO, and EMA can be used to test the stability of a molecule, but the complexity and high variability of food matrix makes the protocol standardization very hard. Better results can be obtained by applying a solid-state stability model based on the accelerated stability assessment program (ASAP) which allowed for evaluation of the effect of main storage parameters and prediction of food storage stability.
To assure a food health value is also necessary to evaluate the impact of the generation and bioaccessibility of toxic compounds in traditional and novel foods. To this aim, different approaches can be used, mainly in vitro not cell-based or cell-based digestion simulation methods.
The first aim of this work is the development of a solid-state stability model, its validation, and its application to monitor the formation/presence of potentially toxic compounds during food conservation and, thus, to define the food shelf-life. Suitable chromatographic and spectroscopy techniques to monitor toxic compounds will be set up.
The second aim is to evaluate the formation of potentially toxic compounds, their bioaccessibility and bioavailability following the digestion process. To this purpose, in vitro models will be set up, both following an adapted Infogest digestion protocol (based on the use of electrolytes and enzymes mixtures and four digestion steps) and developing an in vitro cell-based dynamic model which could better simulate the in vivo conditions (based on the use of bioreactors simulating each a different district – gastric, intestinal, and hepatic). The safety profile of the compounds generated during food digestion will be evaluated on Caco-2 cells as in vitro model of intestinal epithelial cell barrier.
The development of a solid-state stability model based on the accelerated stability assessment program (ASAP) will strongly reduce the monitoring time in the evaluation of food shelf-life. In addition, this model could be used to evaluate the potential formation of toxic compounds during the food shelf-life.
The development of in vitro digestion models, in particular the dynamic model, will give the possibility to confirm the effective generation or release of toxic compounds. Similarly, it will be possible to point out the generation of toxic compounds following food digestion process by in vitro tests.
