Food-grade systems for delivery of DHA and EPA: Opportunities, fabrication, characterization and future perspectives

Abstract

Docosahexaenoic acid (C22: 6n-3, DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (C20: 5n-3, EPA) have been shown to provide the opportunity to inhibit onset and escalation of chronic diseases. Nevertheless, their undesirable characteristics including poor water solubility, oxidation sensitivity, high melting point and unpleasant sensory attributes hinder their application in the food industry. In recent years, utilizing food-grade delivery systems to deliver DHA/EPA and improve their biological efficacy has emerged as an attractive approach with fascinating prospects. This review focuses on introducing potential delivery systems for DHA/EPA, including microemulsions, nanoemulsions, Pickering emulsions, hydrogels, lipid particles, oleogels, liposomes, microcapsules and micelles. The opportunities, fabrication and characterization of these delivery systems loaded with DHA/EPA are highlighted. Besides, food sources of DHA/EPA, their benefits to the human body and a series of challenges for effective utilization of DHA/EPA are discussed. Promising future research trends of food-grade systems for delivery of DHA/EPA are also presented. Conducting in vivo experiments, applying DHA/EPA-loaded delivery systems into real food, improving the applicability of such delivery systems in industrial production, co-encapsulating DHA/EPA with other substances, seeking measures to improve the performance of existing delivery systems and developing novel food-grade delivery systems inspired by other fields are various future considerations.

Keywords:

• Docosahexaenoic acid
• eicosapentaenoic acid
• existing challenges
• food-grade delivery systems
• future perspectives

Author contributions

Q. Zhou collected literature and drafted the manuscript. Z. Wei conceptualized the idea, drafted the outline, gave a guide to professional knowledge, edited and revised the article.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest and no competing financial interest.

Funding

This work was supported by the startup fund from Ocean University of China (grant No. 862001013134). This work was also funded by the National Key R&D Program of China (grant No. 2018YFC0311201).