Study of UV and thermal stability of Vitamin D3 loaded in yeast cells of Saccharomyces cerevisiae microcapsules

Vitamin D is a fat soluble nutrient which was help to improve human health. There are different problems in VD3 fortification of foods including low water solubility and susceptibility to environmental conditions. Microencapsulation of VD3 could be used to overcome these limitations. Encapsulation of VD3 in yeast cells can be counted as an affective technique to provide a protection against VD3-photochemical degradation.

In this study, VD3 was encapsulated in Saccharomyces cerevisiae yeast cells as encapsulating matrix. Microcapsules were dried by spray drier and freeze drier. Two concentration of vitamin (100 and 500 IU) used for bread fortification. Furthermore, the effect of UV irradiation and thermal treatment (80 °C for 1 minutes) on stability of free and encapsulated vitamin D was investigated.

The results showed, about 40% and 95% of vitamin were remained after application of UV and high temperature treatment, respectively. In addition, yeast cells could provide good protection against (more than 95%) high temperature of bread baking process (180 °C for 30min). The analysis of bread quality and sensory properties showed higher value of bread containing encapsulated VD3 in comparison to free form. The results of this study show that the Saccharomyces cerevisiae yeast cell could be used as a suitable carrier for encapsulation of VD3.