Solubility and aggregation of commercial α-lactalbumin at neutral pH

Heat-induced aggregation of whey proteins in aqueous solutions below their isoelectric point

Processing beverages containing high concentrations of globular proteins represents a technological challenge due to their instability during heating caused by protein aggregation and gelation. Aggregation of whey protein mixtures was investigated in aqueous model systems at pH 3.5, 4.0, and 4.5 at heating conditions resembling conventional industrial treatment (90 °C for 30 s). The extent of aggregation progressively decreased moving away from the pI. Protein aggregates became smaller and had a more open structure compared to higher pH values. Significant loss of protein dispersibility occurred at pH 4.0 and 4.5 above the denaturation T of whey protein (∼70 °C), at which aggregation was caused by intermolecular hydrophobic interactions. Accessible thiol groups were detected in the heat-treated systems, with a higher intensity at higher pH and increasing extent of aggregation. Intermolecular -S-S- bonding played only a minor role in the aggregation at all conditions studied.

Analysis of local polarity change around Cys34 in bovine serum albumin during N-->B transition by a polarity-sensitive fluorescence probe

The change trend of the local environment of Cys34 domain in bovine serum albumin has been studied as a function of pH value by using thiol-specific and polarity-sensitive fluorescent probe 3-(4-chloro-6-p-maleimidylphenoxyl-1,3,5-triazinylamino)-7-dimethylamino-2-methyl-phenazine. The local polarity of the Cys34 domain is found to rise with the increase of pH values, and the corresponding dielectric constant is raised from 12.8 at pH 6.0 to 23.3 at pH 9.1. The result shows that the environment of the Cys34 domain is rather hydrophobic in normal state at pH 6.0 and becomes a little hydrophilic in the course of N-->B transition, which may be attributed to the slight unfolding of the protein and thus the increasing of exposure of the previously relatively buried Cys34. In addition, the increased dielectric constant (23.3) is much lower than that (80.1) of water, suggesting that the unfolding of bovine serum albumin does not cause the full exposure of the Cys34 to the aqueous media during the transition.