Investigation of novel cold atmospheric plasma sources and their impact on the structural and functional characteristics of pea protein

The impact of three cold atmospheric plasma (CAP) sources, atmospheric pressure plasma jet (APPJ), two dimension dielectric barrier discharge (2D-DBD), and nanosecond pulsed discharge (ns-pulsed) on the structure, functionality, and amino acid composition of pea protein was evaluated. Different plasma sources and associated reactive species resulted in protein denaturation, increased surface hydrophobicity, formation of soluble aggregates mostly by disulfide linkages, and changes in secondary structures. Enhancement in surface properties, presence of soluble aggregates, and increase in beta-sheet contributed to significant improvement in gelation and emulsification. Enhanced emulsion stability was attributed to relatively small droplet sizes and high surface charge. Differences among CAP-treated samples were attributed to differences in fluence and composition of plasma-produced reactive species. While all three plasma treatments could be appreciable functionalization approaches, 2D-DBD (Ar + O2) treatment for 30 min had insignificant effect on the amino acid composition.

Automated summary

This study evaluated the impact of three different cold atmospheric plasma (CAP) sources, atmospheric pressure plasma jet (APPJ), two dimension dielectric barrier discharge (2D-DBD), and nanosecond pulsed discharge (ns-pulsed), on the structure, functionality, and amino acid composition of pea protein. The plasma treatments resulted in protein denaturation, increased surface hydrophobicity, formation of soluble aggregates mainly through disulfide linkages, and changes in secondary structures. Improved surface properties, presence of soluble aggregates, and increased beta-sheet content contributed to enhanced gelation and emulsification. Significant improvement in emulsion stability was attributed to smaller droplet sizes and higher surface charge. The differences among CAP-treated samples were due to variations in plasma fluence and composition of reactive species. While all three plasma treatments showed appreciable functionalization effects, 30 min 2D-DBD (Ar + O2) treatment had negligible impact on the amino acid composition.