Interfacial and enhanced emulsifying behavior of phosphorylated ovalbumin

Improvement of emulsifying properties by phosphorylation could have a wide potential application in food industry. In this study, ovalbumin (OVA) was phosphorylated under wet-heating in the presence of sodium tripolyphosphate. Phosphorylated OVA (P-OVA) with low, middle, high phosphorus content were obtained with reaction time increased. Their enhanced emulsification capacity and the mechanism were investigated. Compared with native OVA (N-OVA), the emulsifying activity and stability of P-OVA were increased by 26% and 109% (P < 0.05), respectively. The structure studies (Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, circular dichroism spectra, scanning electron microscope) demonstrated that introduction of phosphate groups to OVA increased the molecular flexibility of P-OVA. The absolute values of surface zeta-potential and surface hydrophobicity were increased as the phosphorus content increased, which indicated that the phosphate group inhibited protein aggregation. And it caused a large amount absorption of protein on the surface of the oil droplets, which ultimately improved the emulsion stability. Both particle size and microscopic results of emulsion showed that the particle size of OVA reduced as the degree of phosphorylation increased, which improved the emulsifying ability.