Patent survey
Patent survey on process biochemistry
Marten Terpstra *
Technisch-Wetenschappelijke, Publicaties Vakliteratuuronderzoek, Landerstraat 53, 2551 Den Haag AB, Netherlands
A process for the production of fermented milk drinks and
food
European patent application 1 201 132 to K.K. Yakult
Honsha, Tokyo, Japan.
Yoshiharu Kuma and co-biochemists, working for the
above company, developed a novel process for the
production of fermented milk drinks and food and
comprising a fermented milk ingredient obtained by
lactic acid fermentation and a lactic acid bacteria
growth factor selected from ginger extract, tea extract,
green onion extract or oleic acid or a derivative thereof.
The inventors carried out several laboratory experi-
ments for the preparation of extracts.
Green tea, oolong tea, washed and crushed ginger and
washed and crushed green onion were separately
extracted for 60 min in aliquots (10 times the weights
of the respective materials) of hot water of 90 8C,
whereby respective extracts were prepared. They were
separately concentrated in an evaporator, and extracts
of [10% soluble solids (Brix 108)] were obtained.
Using aliquots of a 20% skim milk powder solution as
a basal medium, the ginger extract, green tea extract,
oolong tea extract and green onion extract, were added
at 0.1% as lactic acid bacteria growth factors, respec-
tively, and profileration degrees of lactic acid bacteria
were studied. Described specifically, the sterilized media
were inoculated with 1% of a starter of Lactobacillus
casei YIT9029, followed by cultivation at 37 8C for 48
h. After the cultivation, the profileration degrees of the
lactic acid bacteria were compared by using as indices
the acidities of the resulting cultures (titers determined
by sampling 10-ml portions of the cultures and then
titrating organic acids in the samples with 0.1 N caustic
soda while using phenolphthalein as an indicator). The
results are shown in Table 1. For the sake of compar-
ison, ‘MEAST’ trademark for beer yeast autolysate;
product of Asahi Beer Food, Ltd) was added at 0.15%,
and cultivation was conducted likewise. This amount of
‘meast’ is practically the upper limit of added amount at
which deleterious effect to the flavour of the cultured
product is still permissible.
As is clear from Table 1, the growth promoting effects
for the lactic acid bacteria by the addition of the ginger
extract, green tea extract, oolong tea extract and green
onion extract were more appreciable than that exhibited
in the medium added with ‘meast’.
A comparison of the profileration degree of the lactic
acid bacteria among the acidities of extracting solutions
was made.
Using hot water (90 8C) of pH 3.0, 4.0 and 5.0,
oolong tea extracts were prepared under the same
conditions as in Example 1. They were separately
concentrated in an evaporator, whereby extracts of
[10% soluble solids (Brix 108)] were obtained.
The individual extracts so obtained were added to
aliquots of a 20% skim milk powder medium such that
their concentrations came 0.1%. The resulting media
were inoculated with Lactobacillus casei YIT9029,
followed by cultivation at 37 8C for 48 h. The acidities
of the thus-obtained cultures were measured and the
results are shown in Table 2.
As is shown in Table 2, the extracts obtained by
conducting extraction with acid solutions of pH 5.0 and
lower, especially pH 4.0 and lower exhibited marked
growth promoting effect for the lactic acid bacteria.
20 pages; 18 claims; 2 graphs; International search
report included.
Japanese patent publications 2-142497; 4-108334; 60-
75233.
International patent application 98/57555.
A method of optimizing fermentation processes
European patent application 1 201 746 to Roche Vitamins
AG, Basel, Switzerland.
* Tel.: '
/
31-70-3259101; fax: '
/
31-70-3252824
E-mail address: sa017971@worldonline.nl (M. Terpstra).
Process Biochemistry 38 (2003) 1105 Á
/
1109
www.elsevier.com/locate/procbio
0032-9592/02/$ - see front matter # 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
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