Spray drying of bioactives

Abstract

Spray drying is a common unit operation for converting solids from liquid materials into powders for preservation, ease of storage, transport and handling, and economic considerations. Although most often considered as a dehydration process, spray drying can also be effective as an encapsulation method when it is used for complexing a core material with a protective matrix, which is ideally inert to the core material being encapsulated. Unlike other encapsulation techniques, it offers the unique advantage of producing microcapsules in a cost-effective one-step continuous process. This chapter describes the principles and processing techniques of spray drying for encapsulation of food bioactives, including probiotics, polyphenols, enzymes and peptides, vitamins, and essential fatty acids. The storage stability of spray dried bioactives and challenges from both a research and industrial perspective are also briefly discussed.