Comparison and synergistic effects of intact proteins and their hydrolysates on the functional properties and antioxidant activities in a simultaneous process of enzymatic hydrolysis

• Innovative process of simultaneous enzymatic hydrolysis.
• Synergistic effects of different protein sources.
• Protein hydrolysates with multifunctional properties.
• Potential application as a natural and safe additive in food industry.

Soy protein isolate (SPI), bovine whey protein (BWP) and egg white protein (EWP) were hydrolyzed with the Flavourzyme 500L® protease, and the interactions of these substrates and their mixtures on their functional properties and antioxidant activities were studied using a simplex centroid mixture design. Synergistic effects between the formulations containing binary or ternary mixtures were observed for several parameters, especially the DPPH radical-scavenging activity and emulsion activity index, which exhibited increases of up to 45.0 and 1200.0%, respectively, after enzymatic hydrolysis compared to the isolated substrates. The results suggest that the application of the statistical mixture designs in a simultaneous process of enzymatic hydrolysis using different protein sources is an attractive method for improving enzyme performance and identifying optimum formulations.