Study on structural, rheological and foaming properties of ovalbumin by ultrasound-assisted glycation with xylose

This study was to evaluate the effect of ultrasound-assisted glycation with xylose on the foaming properties, physicochemical and structural characteristics of ovalbumin (OVA). The number of free amino groups in the glycated OVA (sOVA-X) significantly decreased with the increase of treatment time. The results obtained by circular dichroism (CD) and spectrofluorimetric measurements showed that there were slight changes on the subunits and secondary structure of OVA, indicating that the tertiary structure became more flexible and loose after the sonicated glycation treatment The glycated OVA had higher solubility and foaming properties than the untreated samples. Therefore, ultrasound improved the glycation extent, and the changes in molecular structure were responsible for their different foaming ability and foaming stability. Our study also provided principle knowledge to understand how the viscosity and rheology were related to the foaming properties of OVA glycation by xylose. The results indicated that ultrasound-assisted glycation could be an excellent approach to improve the functional properties of OVA and promote its application in food industry.