Food Oligosaccharides

A growing awareness of the relationship between diet andhealth has led to an increasing demand for food
products that support health beyond simply providing basicnutrition. Digestive
health is the largest segment of the burgeoning functional foodmarket worldwide. Incorporation of bioactive
oligosaccharides into foods can yield health benefits in thegastrointestinal
tract and other parts of the body that are linked via the immunesystem.
Because oligosaccharides can be added to a wide variety offoodstuffs, there is
much interest within the food industry in incorporating thesefunctional
ingredients into healthy food products. Moreover, other areas suchas
pharmaceuticals, bioenergy and environmental science can exploitthe
physicochemical and physiological properties of bioactiveoligosaccharides too.
There is therefore a considerable demand for a concentrated sourceof
information on the development and characterization of newoligosaccharides
with novel and/or improved bioactivities.

Food Oligosaccharides: Production, Analysis andBioactivityis a comprehensive reference on the
naturally occurring and synthesised oligosaccharides, which willenable food
professionals to select and use these components in their products.It is
divided into three sections: (i) Production and bioactivityof
oligosaccharides, (ii) Analysis and (iii) Prebiotics in FoodFormulation. The
book addresses classical and advanced techniques to structurallycharacterize and
quantitatively analyse food bioactive oligosaccharides. It alsolooks at practical
issues faced by food industry professionals seeking to incorporateprebiotic
oligosaccharides into food products, including the effects ofprocessing on
prebiotic bioavailability. This book is essential reading for foodresearchers
and professionals, nutritionists and product developers working inthe food
industry, and students of Food Science with an interest infunctional foods.