Milk proteins contain numerous potential bioactive peptides, which may be released by digestive proteases or by the proteolytic system of lactic acid bacteria during food processing. The capacity of Streptococcus thermophilus to generate peptides, especially bioactive peptides, from bovine caseins was investigated. Strains expressing various levels of the cell envelope proteinase, PrtS, were incubated with α(s1)-, α(s2)-, or β-casein. Analysis of the supernatants by LC-ESI-MS/MS showed that the β-casein was preferentially hydrolyzed, followed by α(s2)-casein and then α(s1)-casein. Numbers and types of peptides released were strain-dependent. Hydrolysis appeared to be linked with the accessibility of different casein regions by protease. Analysis of bonds hydrolyzed in the region 1-23 of α(s1)-casein suggests that PrtS is at least in part responsible for the peptide production. Finally, among the generated peptides, 13 peptides from β-casein, 5 from α(s2)-casein, and 2 from α(s1)-casein have been reported as bioactive, 15 of them being angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors.

No abstract

The acquisition of prtS by Streptococcus thermophilus strains allowed hydrolysis of caseins into peptides and then to increase their growth in milk. This leads to faster milk acidification, which is important in dairy industry. However, some strains harboring the same allele of prtS present different acidification rates, which could be explained by a difference in the regulation of prtS expression. We chose two strains with the same allele of prtS (including the same promoter region): one, PB302, is with high acidification rate while the other, PB18O, is without. They exhibited similar growth in M17, but not in milk, where PB302 showed better growth. The expression of prtS and activity of PrtS were lower in PB18O, in the two media tested. We demonstrated that other genes known to be involved in carbon and nitrogen metabolism were overexpressed in PB302. Interestingly, these genes were overexpressed in milk compared to M17. Nearly all these genes possessed a putative CodY-box in their promoter region. Taken together, difference of gene expression detected in PB302 between milk (low-peptide medium) and M17 (rich-peptide medium) and presence of a putative CodY-box is a feature of the transcriptional pattern of CodY-regulated genes. Altogether, our results propose that acquisition of prtS is not enough in certain strains to achieve rapid milk acidification. High transcriptional level of dtpT, amiF, ilvC, ilvB, bcaT, livJ, ackA, codY, and prtS in fast acidifying strain suggests that this transcriptional pattern could be required for fast milk acidification in Streptococcus thermophilus.