Nature-inspired modification of plant proteins into bio-conjugates; opportunities and challenges for emulsification...

The search for plant-based raw materials has strengthened the requirement to expand the performance of plant proteins. Nature-inspired conjugation, through mimicking natural post-translational modifications (PTMs), suggests a promising route to generate bio-conjugates for innovative emulsification and encapsulation. Conjugation is still the utmost usual method aimed at the modification of food proteins that can be fabricated via simple, easy-scalable procedures. As owning health-promoting aspects, bio-conjugates can introduce the clean/green (label) ingredients, compared with inconvenient and costly techniques. This study is taking a cue from nature for alternating the plant-based proteins through polysaccharides, polyphenols and lipid components and designing green plant-based nano-conjugates (via the selection of proper compounds). Nevertheless, this review critically evaluates a central restriction as there is an important biomimetic gap between the accurate and effective alterations created in nature and the simple and non-detailed approaches such as Maillard reaction, alkali treatment, etc. that are presently performed in vitro. Here, different methods of conjugating plant proteins with conjugates are described. Furthermore, the digestive tract or food matrix can promote the release of bioactive components, so the characteristics of drug delivery systems that can influence such phenomena will be discussed, as well as the technical-functional applications of such systems and drug delivery systems. Also, health-related risk assessments related to natural reactions and bio-conjugated nanostructures will be discussed. Lastly, we provide a critical perspective on the tasks of scalability, regulatory, and safety verification. We provide a forward-looking review of how a more rational, nature-inspired design philosophy can push the boundaries and hasten the expansion of next-generation green/clean (label) colloidal delivery systems.