Functional Categorisation of Dietary Fibre in Foods: Beyond ‘Soluble’ vs ‘Insoluble’

Conclusions: The physicochemical properties of dietary fibre components that are relevant to digestive tract functionality can be classified under the headings of binding, structuring, and transport barriers. Major nutritional outcomes such as control of macronutrient digestion or the nature of residual digesta that are available for fermentation by the large intestinal microbiota depend on combinations of these physicochemical properties in ways which are not readily reflected by a soluble vs insoluble fibre definition. An alternative approach is proposed based on 2D mapping of dietary fibre materials as a function of molecule/particle size and local density. This effectively separates diverse fibre materials and can be linked semi-quantitatively with functionally-important properties.
Source: Trends in Food Science and Technology - Category: Food Science Source Type: research