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Foods
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Innovations and Applications in Encapsulation of Food Bioactive Ingredients
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Innovations and Applications in Encapsulation of Food Bioactive Ingredients

A special issue of Foods (ISSN 2304-8158). This special issue belongs to the section "Food Physics and (Bio)Chemistry".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 5 November 2025 | Viewed by 2726

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Jixian Zhang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Food Science and Engineering, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou 225127, China
Interests: food bioactive ingredients; encapsulation technology; food physical processing; delivery system
Dr. Chaoting Wen

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Food Science and Engineering, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou 225127, China.
Interests: food protein; polysaccharide based delivery carrier; physical processing; liposome nanocarrier; food precise nutrition
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Some food bioactive ingredients (curcumin, resveratrol, etc.) play important biological functions in the human body. Still, their bioavailability cannot be fully utilized due to environmental stress during storage and gastrointestinal barriers such as pH and enzymes during digestion. Seeking breakthroughs in the stability and targeted delivery of bioactive ingredients during storage and digestion is fundamental to their application in the food industry. Besides, using key compounds for the modification of carriers is crucial in achieving precise targeting nutrition. Hence, the application of innovative encapsulation technology and specific modifications especially focused on specific biomacromolecules (polysaccharides, proteins, etc.)  to load bioactive ingredients is a powerful solution for the issues mentioned above. This special issue aims to explore the current research progress, innovative potential, and industry demand for encapsulation technology of food bioactive ingredients. Therefore, this special issue welcomes submissions from different delivery systems regarding the encapsulation of food bioactive ingredients, including preparation, modification, characterization, stability, digestion process, precise targeting evaluation, and more. In addition, insightful reviews are more popular and highly regarded.

Dr. Jixian Zhang
Dr. Chaoting Wen
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Foods is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • food bioactive ingredients
  • functional factor stabilization
  • encapsulation
  • delivery system
  • controlled release
  • stability
  • precise nutrition
  • bioavailability
  • biological activity

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

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24 pages, 2332 KB  
Article
Antioxidant Potential of Jostaberry Phytochemicals Encapsulated in Biopolymer Matrices During Storage
by Angela Gurev, Viorica Bulgaru, Veronica Dragancea, Olga Smerea, Alexei Baerle, Georgiana Gabriela Codină and Aliona Ghendov-Mosanu
Foods 2025, 14(17), 3092; https://doi.org/10.3390/foods14173092 - 3 Sep 2025
Abstract
The jostaberry (Ribes × nidigrolaria) hybrid is a rich source of phytochemicals with high antioxidant activity (AA). However, due to the thick skin and seeds, the whole fruits are rejected by some consumers, and their incorporation into food products may negatively [...] Read more.
The jostaberry (Ribes × nidigrolaria) hybrid is a rich source of phytochemicals with high antioxidant activity (AA). However, due to the thick skin and seeds, the whole fruits are rejected by some consumers, and their incorporation into food products may negatively affect the sensory properties. Furthermore, after drying, including freeze-drying, jostaberries become sticky and gummy, making them unsuitable for grinding into powder. In this context, the present study aims to improve the handling properties and evaluate the biological value, antioxidant potential, physicochemical characteristics, and color parameters of biopolymer microparticles enriched with biologically active compounds (BACs) from jostaberry during freeze-drying and subsequent storage in the dark under ambient conditions (22 ± 1 °C, relative humidity ≤ 75%). For this, jostaberry extract (JE) was encapsulated using combinations of biocompatible carriers: maltodextrin-nutriose (resistant dextrin)-pectin and maltodextrin-nutriose-sodium alginate. The encapsulated products were freeze-dried to obtain microparticles (MNPJ and MNAJ) with yields of 87.7% and 88.9%, respectively. It was found that the biopolymer matrix provided superior protection for the encapsulated BACs during freeze-drying compared to the fruit matrix. The AA determined in MNPJ and MNAJ microparticles by DPPH and ABTS assays decreased only 1.1 and 1.5 times, respectively, while in freeze-dried jostaberry, AA showed a decrease of 3.7 times (DPPH) and 2.3 times (ABTS), respectively. Tukey’s post hoc HSD analysis revealed multiple significant differences (p < 0.05) between storage intervals for all measured parameters. While DPPH and ABTS values progressively decreased, total polyphenols (TPC) and anthocyanins concentration (TAC) and their retention efficiency showed changes after specific storage intervals (3, 6 and 12 months). After 12 months of storage, TPC and TAC decreased by 8.2% and 12.2% in MNPJ and by 3.3% and 3.9% in MNAJ, respectively. Therefore, microparticles containing sodium alginate showed the lowest BAC loss during storage. The obtained results reveal that after 12 months of storage, the color and physicochemical properties of the microparticles remained largely stable. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Innovations and Applications in Encapsulation of Food Bioactive Ingredients)
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Review

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45 pages, 4041 KB  
Review
Strategic Approaches for Co-Encapsulation of Bioactive Compounds: Technological Advances and Mechanistic Insight
by Chaoting Wen, Jialuo Tang, Liyan Cao, Meidi Fan, Xinying Lin, Guoyan Liu, Li Liang, Xiaofang Liu, Jixian Zhang, Youdong Li and Xin Xu
Foods 2025, 14(12), 2024; https://doi.org/10.3390/foods14122024 - 7 Jun 2025
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1954
Abstract
In food science, the application of bioactive compounds is promising, but the deficiencies in their solubility, stability, and bioavailability seriously limit their efficacy. Co-delivery can control the release of bioactive substances and achieve synergistic effects to enhance efficacy. For this reason, co-delivery systems [...] Read more.
In food science, the application of bioactive compounds is promising, but the deficiencies in their solubility, stability, and bioavailability seriously limit their efficacy. Co-delivery can control the release of bioactive substances and achieve synergistic effects to enhance efficacy. For this reason, co-delivery systems have emerged as a novel strategy that has attracted much attention from researchers in recent years. This review provides an in-depth analysis of the unique properties of different bioactive ingredients and systematically describes the latest research progress of co-encapsulation systems such as emulsions, nanoparticles, and liposomes. It also introduces their advanced characterization tools. Meanwhile, the kinetic law of the release of bioactive ingredients in vivo and its molecular mechanism are discussed in depth through experimental data and theoretical analysis. In addition, the potential application value of the co-encapsulation system in the food industry is also introduced in detail. In summary, this study not only provides a solid theoretical foundation and rich reference basis for further research in the field of co-encapsulation, but also provides new ideas and directions to promote the construction and development of rational and efficient co-encapsulation systems, and to promote the innovation and development of functional foods and precision nutrition. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Innovations and Applications in Encapsulation of Food Bioactive Ingredients)
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