No abstract

Soy protein, mixed with gluten and starch, was extruded into fibrous meat analogues under high-moisture and high-temperature conditions. The protein solubility of samples collected at different extruder zones and extrudates made with different moistures was determined by 11 extraction solutions consisting of 6 selective reagents and their combinations: phosphate salts, urea, DTT, thiourea, Triton X-100, and CHAPS. Protein solubility by most extractants showed decreasing patterns as the material passed through the extruder, but the solution containing all 6 reagents, known as isoelectric focus (IEF) buffer, solubilized the highest levels and equal amounts of proteins in all samples, indicating that there are no other covalent bonds involved besides disulfide bonds. With regard to relative importance between disulfide bonds and non-covalent interactions, different conclusions could be made from protein solubility patterns, depending on the type of extracting systems and a baseline used for comparison. The observation points out pitfalls and limitation of current protein solubility methodology and explains why controversy exists in the literature. Using the IEF buffer system with omission of one or more selective reagents is considered to be the right methodology to conduct protein solubility study and thus recommended. Results obtained with this system indicate that disulfide bonding plays a more important role than non-covalent bonds in not only holding the rigid structure of extrudates but also forming fibrous texture. The sharpest decrease in protein solubility occurred when the mix passed through the intermediate section of the extruder barrel, indicating formation of new disulfide bonds during the stage of dramatic increase in both temperature and moisture. After this stage, although the physical form of the product might undergo change and fiber formation might occur as it passed through the cooling die, the chemical nature of the product did not change significantly.

Summary. The maximum likelihood approach to jointly model the survival time and its longitudinal covariates has been successful to model both processes in longitudinal studies. Random effects in the longitudinal process are often used to model the survival times through a proportional hazards model, and this invokes an EM algorithm to search for the maximum likelihood estimates (MLEs). Several intriguing issues are examined here, including the robustness of the MLEs against departure from the normal random effects assumption, and difficulties with the profile likelihood approach to provide reliable estimates for the standard error of the MLEs. We provide insights into the robustness property and suggest to overcome the difficulty of reliable estimates for the standard errors by using bootstrap procedures. Numerical studies and data analysis illustrate our points.

The effect of processing variables, including screw speed (200, 300, and 400 rpm), moisture content (18, 19.5, and 21%), and four different percentages (55, 70, 85, and 100%) of oat flour, on the extrudate physical properties (expansion, bulk density, and texture profiles) and sensory properties were studied. Increasing the percentage of oat flour resulted in extrudates with a lower specific length, higher bulk density, lower lightness, higher redness, lower yellowness, higher hardness, and lower springiness, gumminess, and chewiness. Higher moisture content reduced expansion, except for the 100% oat flour puffs. Screw speed had no significant effect on the bulk density, specific length, and expansion ratio. Principal Component Analysis showed that decreasing moisture content and increasing screw speed resulted in increased product temperature, which was highly correlated with attributes of a more expanded product such as lightness, crispness, shininess, and an open cell structure. With a higher screw speed and a higher product temperature, corn-related flavors were more likely to develop. High correlations between physical and sensory properties were observed.