Different digestion of caprine whey proteins by human and porcine gastrointestinal enzymes

Abstract

The objective of the present study was twofold: first to compare the degradation patterns of caprine whey proteins digested with either human digestive juices (gastric or duodenal) or commercial porcine enzymes (pepsin or pancreatic enzymes) and second to observe the effect of gastric pH on digestion. An in vitro two-step assay was performed at 37C to simulate digestion in the stomach (pH 2, 4 or 6) and the duodenum (pH 8). The whey proteins were degraded more efficiently by porcine pepsin than by human gastric juice at all pH values. Irrespective of the enzyme source, gastric digestion at pH 2 followed by duodenal digestion resulted in the most efficient degradation. Lactoferrin, serum albumin and the Ig heavy chains were highly degraded with less than 6% remaining after digestion. About 15, 56 and 50% Ig light chains, -lactoglobulin (-LG) and -lactalbumin remained intact, respectively, when digested with porcine enzymes compared with 25, 74 and 81% with human digestive juices. For comparison, purified bovine -LG was digested and the peptide profiles obtained were compared with those of the caprine -LG in the digested whey. The bovine -LG seemed to be more extensively cleaved than the caprine -LG in the whey. Commercial enzymes appear to digest whey proteins more efficiently compared with human digestive juices when used at similar enzyme activities. This could lead to conflicting results when comparing human in vivo protein digestion with digestion using purified enzymes of non-human species. Consequently the use of human digestive juices might be preferred. © 2010 The Authors.