Effect of cell wall modifying enzymes on the rheological behaviour of citrus fibre dispersions

Nowadays there are no doubts about the positive impact that fruits and vegetables have on human health. Plant fibres (i.e. non-digestible carbohydrates) are widely present in daily food, such as soups, dressings and sauces. On the other hand, agricultural (non-wood) by-products have a low economical value. However, those residues are frequently important sources of fibres so an important research is being done in order to obtain new high-value applications for such materials. Within Unilever, a technology is being developed based on plant fibre material for product structuring purpose. Structural changes on plant fibres dispersions due to enzymatic treatments were therefore studied along this project, based on the rheological behavior. In this project, the effect of several cell wall modifying enzymes (purified, industrial, and mix of enzymes) on the microstructure of plant fibres dispersions has been studied. Besides rheological tests, other techniques – CSLM and density tests – have been applied in order to fully characterize the aforementioned microstructure.