The nutraceutical properties of lupin seed : focus on proteins and peptides

THE NUTRACEUTICAL PROPERTIES OF LUPIN SEED: FOCUS ON PROTEINS AND PEPTIDES. Arnoldi Anna, Boschin Giovanna, Resta Donatella, Scigliuolo Graziana, Sirtori Elena Dipartimento di Endocrinologia, Fisiopatologia, Biologia Applicata (DEFIB), Università degli Studi di Milano, Via Balzaretti 9, 20133 Milano, Italy. * anna.arnoldi@unimi.it Seeds of Lupinus albus have been used as food by the Mediterranean populations for over 4,000 years, whereas other lupin species L. angustifolius and L. luteus has been used mostly as feed. In recent years, the introduction of sweet cultivars has enormously expanded the possibility of using lupin both in human and livestock nutrition. The high protein content (about 35-40%) indicates that lupin has the potential to become a useful source of protein ingredients to be exploited in replacement for milk, egg, or soybean proteins. Lupin has some characteristics that may be appreciated by consumers and food industry: the content of antinutritional factors is lower than in other legumes, the level of phytoestrogens is negligible, the bean-like flavor, typical of other beans, is rather mild and no genetically modified varieties are commercially available. Other favorable features are related to some key technological functionalities, in particular the capability of stabilizing emulsions and foams, useful in food formulation. Recently, this seed has attracted the interests of nutritionists and pharmacologists. Different groups all over the world have investigated the hypocholesterolemic activity in animal models (rat, rabbit, pig, chicken) or in humans; the hypotensive activity in rats and hymans; the anti-atherosclerotic activity in rabbit; the hypoglycemic activity in rats and in humans. All these investigations indicate that lupin may become a useful source of bioactive ingredients.