1179Cocoa Butter-Sodium Caseinate-Gum Arabic Ternary Complex Enhances Spray-Drying Survival and Digestive Tolerance of Lactiplantibacillus plantarum
State Key Laboratory of Food Nutrition and Safety, College of Food Science and Engineering, Tianjin University of Science and Technology, Tianjin, 300457, China.
A ternary coacervation system comprising sodium caseinate, cocoa butter, and gum arabic was developed to enhance Lactiplantibacillus plantarum survival during spray drying. Sodium caseinate demonstrated optimal protection at 10% (w/w), while cocoa butter incorporation significantly improved thermal resistance via endothermic phase transitions. The binary sodium caseinate-cocoa butter complex (1:1 mass ratio) achieved 72.94% survival rate, with subsequent gum arabic integration generating dense electrostatic interfacial matrices. Optimization of the ternary system at pH 3.75 using a 1:1 mass ratio of sodium caseinate-cocoa butter to gum arabic yielded 86.25% probiotic survival, concurrently enhancing heat buffering capacity, digestive resistance, and storage stability. Microstructure analysis verified coacervate integrity, which improved both storage stability and digestive resistance during in vitro simulation. This approach establishes a reliable method for augmenting probiotic processing stability and bioavailability, demonstrating significant potential for functional food and biological delivery applications
