Proteomics Applied to Foods: An Introduction

The study of the composition and function of food proteins has evolved over the last years until arriving to a self-standing discipline that relies on innovative instrumental platforms. In this frame, the recent development and optimization of integrated analytical approaches based on ‘omic’ techniques for investigating the proteome of a food at the molecular level has produced innovative tools for the qualification, authentication, security and safety assessment of traditional and novel food sources. This volume illustrates the most advanced proteomic procedures in food science and nutrition, based on the extensive use of high-throughput methodologies for sample preparation, mass spectrometry techniques and data processing strategies to solve the challenges of research in the field of food proteins. The chapters of the book offer a comprehensive view of the present food proteomics applications. In addition, all the chapters include the newest relevant references to the literature, enabling the reader to explore individual topics in depth and to apply them in the practice of their laboratory. The topics covered include: protein extraction from ‘difficult’ matrices—plant and novel foods, but also from cell cultures for food nutritional assays; preparation of sample for mass spectrometry-based proteomics and metabolomics, data processing. Considering the complexity of the proteome of foods, that require dedicated approaches for specific subset of proteins, pipelines for glycoproteomics, thiolomics, protein digestomics, as well as for the analysis of food protein toxins and bacterial proteins are also detailed in the volume.