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.
Fermented plant-based innovative products as healthy and sustainable l...
Coordinator
Innovation of food (bio)processing using smart and mild technologies and fermentation to improve nutritional quality while ensuring safety and environmental sustainability throughout the shelf life of foods. Nutritional quality and biodiversity are targeted through both advanced and sustainable processes (including encapsulation) to preserve and improve at-risk (micro)nutrient composition of relevant food categories and exploiting microbiological and biotechnological applications to impact on nutritional quality. Such (bio)technological approaches (e.g., fermentation, enzyme treatments, etc.) are validated by process markers also directed to ensure food production safety and quality targeting new food habits (e.g., ready to eat food and novel food consumption) and sustainability, promoting production efficiency and utilisation of alternative sources (in connection with Spoke 2 and 3).
Scaling up of the most promising prototypes and validation of concepts from small to large scale, also in connection with start-up acceleration programmes.
Development or improvement of at least 3 biotechnological approaches to innovate food production in terms of nutritional quality, safety, and sustainability (M30)
Proof of concept and scale up of at least one promising food product (M36)
The modern lifestyle and the growth of the global population deeply affect the dietary choices and protein-rich foods demand, putting complex challenges on the food sector, regarding both human and environmental health. Due to the increasing awareness of negative effects of huge meat consumption and low sustainability for its production, plant-based meat surrogates have received increasing attention as sustainable alternatives. On the other hand, innovative “green” solutions, tailored to specific plant-based raw materials and able to boost safety, quality, and nutritional value of foods, are needed to shift toward healthier and plant-based dietary habits. Fermentation is a natural process characterized by low energy consumption and low wastewater generation and can represent a sustainable approach to enhance the safety, nutritional value and the digestibility of plant-based ingredients increasing final product sensory properties and acceptability in a “clean label” approach.
The design and prototyping of innovative healthy plant-based products will be addressed exploiting the natural microbial biodiversity of microbial culture collections to set-up fermentation consortia for tailored processes on non-conventional substrates (i.e. nuts, legumes or mushrooms etc.). The project will start from the characterization of microbial strains endowed with peculiar properties (i.e. bioprotective or aromatic) selected as starters and able to impart specific attributes to innovative plant-based fermented products. Environmental-friendly and sustainable fermentation processes will be set-up to boost the product shelf-life, safety, sensory and nutritional features. Product characteristics will be evaluated to compare different microbial consortia performances, and the processes will be optimized on the raw material and products peculiarity. The best performing consortia and fermentation will be upscaled and the innovative prototypes produced in industrial relevant environment.
The characterization of new microbial strains will allow the selection of microbial consortia with specific functional and technological characteristics. Their implementation in tailored biotechnological solutions will permit to develop innovative healthy plant-based fermented products, optimizing their performances in relation to specific substrates. The obtained product prototypes will be further produced in pilot scale or relevant environment. These mild-processing and biopreservation approaches will enhance the availability of mild processed plant-based foods, with good sensory properties and high nutritional values, satisfying the increasing demand of consumers for alternative proteins that are plant based, fresh-tasting and carry high nutritive value, and, at the same time, lightly preserved.
