Probiotics and Prebiotics in Fermented Products

Dear Colleagues,

Probiotics are considered as dietary supplements that stabilize the gut microbiome and mycobiome. Probiotic strains should exhibit the subsequent characteristics to be observed as functional food ingredients: acid and bile-stability, tolerance to digestive enzymes, adhesion to intestinal wall, anti-microbial activity, anti-carcinogenic and anti-mutagenic activity, cholesterol reducing effects, stimulation of the immune system without inflammatory effects, improvement of bowel motility, conservation of mucosal stability, antioxidant, auto-aggregation and production of vitamins and enzymes. Prebiotics are a group of nutrients that are degraded by gut microbiota. Fructo-oligosaccharides and galacto-oligosaccharides are the two important groups of prebiotics with beneficial effects on human health. Traditional food fermentation was innovated by the ancient people by their “ethno-microbiological knowledge” for consumption of flavoursome, tasty, healthy and organoleptically preferred fermented foods and alcoholic beverages. Functional microorganisms in traditional fermented foods and beverages orchestrate the food matrix, which has been validated for their functional properties including probiotics to consumers. Probiotic organisms include some lactic acid bacteria (LAB), non-lactic acid bacteria such as spp. of Propionibacterium and Bifidobacterium and some yeasts, which are extensively studied including clinical trials on human health, and some are commercialized across the world. Original research papers and reviews on some of the latest topics and issues on prebiotics and prebiotics in fermented foods such as in vitro and genetic screening of bacteria, yeasts and fungi as probiotics, whole genome analysis for probiotics traits, in silico analysis for putative probiotic genes by metagenome assembled-genomes (MAGs), metabolomics of prebiotics, meta-analysis of probiotics, etc.

Prof. Dr. Jyoti Prakash Tamang
Prof. Dr. Nagendra P. Shah
Dr. Baltasar Mayo
Guest Editors

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