Effects of pulsed electric field treatment on a bovine serum albumin-dextran model system, a means of promoting the Maillard reaction

Effects of pulsed electric field treatment on browning intensity, antioxidant activity, protein patterns and chemical structure of the bovine serum albumin-dextran copolymer were investigated. Results showed Maillard reaction between bovine serum albumin and dextran was significantly accelerated when the electric field intensity was higher than 10 kV/cm, which was proved by changes in A(294), browning, antioxidant activity and electrophoresis tests. At the same time, pronounced changes of chemical structure were found by circular dichroism test. The alpha-helix, beta-sheet, beta-turns and random coil were changed from approximately 42.6%, 1.9%, 17.5% and 33.9% to 14.5%, 33.0%, 21.2% and 30.2%, respectively, after treatment at 20 kV/cm for 7.35 ms. All data indicated that pulsed electric field was a means to promote Maillard-based copolymerisation. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.