Effects of dielectric barrier discharge plasma-assisted glycation with different monosaccharides on the antigenicity and structure of β-lactoglobulin

This work investigated the effects of dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma treatments with different monosaccharides on the antigenicity of β-lactoglobulin (β-LG). The findings demonstrated that the monosaccharide type influenced the antigenic and structural properties of β-LG during DBD plasma-assisted glycation. Among the several monosaccharides used in this study, the antigenicity of β-LG could be reduced the most effectively to 64.9% by DBD plasma-assisted glycation with arabinose. The optimal conditions for this process were determined to be a mass ratio of arabinose to β-LG of 2:1, a plasma treatment power of 80.0 W, and a treatment duration of 2 min. The results of correlation analysis showed that the reduction of the antigenicity of β-LG subjected to plasma-assisted glycation was correlated with the greater extent of glycation, increased contents of β-sheet and β-turn, the increment of the absolute value of zeta potential, and the enlargement of particle size. Concurrently, the decreases in the zeta potential, thiol group content, surface hydrophobicity, and fluorescence intensity also played key roles in the reduction of the antigenicity. Therefore, cold plasma-assisted glycation has great potential in the application of reducing food allergenicity. © 2025 Elsevier Ltd