Background: Food fraud has become an increasingly worldwide problem mainly driven by rapid innovation in the food sector and constantly changing consumer's choices. This led to an increased necessity to improve/establish reliable authentication processes, resulting in the replacement of protein-based techniques for dairy products authentication by higher sensitive and reproducible DNA-based methods. Most used molecular methods for dairy products authentication include PCR, Real-time PCR, multiplex PCR, and PCR-RFLP. Despite the several molecular methods available for species/breeds differentiation in dairy products, there is a need for the development of more efficient and reliable molecular tools. Scope and approach: In this review, traditional and more recent DNA-based methods for dairy products authentication are discussed and analysed. Moreover, the increasingly important role of bioinformatic tools for analysis of large amount of data and for the development of DNA markers is also discussed. Key findings and conclusions: DNA quality is one of the major factors affecting molecular-based dairy products authentication, which can be influenced by the manufacturing process, extraction method employed, chemical composition of the food matrix, among others. PCR-based methods continue to be the most important and successfully used for dairy products authentication. The DNA markers chosen for species/breed detection are an important factor for PCR success. Although there are several molecular methods for the detection of adulterant species, there is still an unmet demand for methods to detect adulterant breeds. Available public databases and bioinformatics revolutionized the analysis of large amount of data and will be pivotal for the development of effective DNA markers.

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The establishment of lignocellulosic biorefineries is dependent on microorganisms being able to cope with the stressful conditions resulting from the release of inhibitory compounds during biomass processing. The yeast Kluyveromyces marxianus has been explored as an alternative microbial factory due to its thermotolerance and ability to natively metabolize xylose. The lignocellulose-derived inhibitors furfural and 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) are considered promising building-block platforms that can be converted into a wide variety of high-value derivatives. Here, several K. marxianus strains, isolated from cocoa fermentation, were evaluated for xylose consumption and tolerance towards acetic acid, furfural, and HMF. The potential of this yeast to reduce furfural and HMF at high inhibitory loads was disclosed and characterized. Our results associated HMF reduction with NADPH while furfural-reducing activity was higher with NADH. In addition, furans’ inhibitory effect was higher when combined with xylose consumption. The furan derivatives produced by K. marxianus in different conditions were identified. Furthermore, one selected isolate was efficiently used as a whole-cell biocatalyst to convert furfural and HMF into their derivatives, furfuryl alcohol and 2,5-bis(hydroxymethyl)furan (BHMF), with high yields and productivities. These results validate K. marxianus as a promising microbial platform in lignocellulosic biorefineries.