Research Direction
Functional Food Group studies the functional factors in foods. Food functional factor refers to the food-derived active substances that can play a role in regulating the specific physiological function of human body without any adverse effects. There are many kinds of food functional factors. We take a variety of bulk and characteristic fruits and vegetables as objects, and mainly study the following two categories of food functional factors:
1. Bioactive polysaccharides
Bioactive polysaccharides refer to a large group of natural macromolecules composed of aldoses or ketoses connected by glycosidic bonds. They are one of the basic substances of life widely existing in the cell wall of plants and microorganisms, and have a variety of important and special physiological activities and functions. We are interested in understanding the structure of various plant bioactive polysaccharides and evaluating their physiological activities, with the ultimate goal of discovering novel functional carbohydrates for the development of functional health food.
2. Isopentenyl phenols
Isopentenyl phenols are another new type of food functional factors that we are interested in. These compounds have novel structures, diverse categories and important biological activities, due to substitution and derivatization of isopentenyl groups to the phenols. For example, its estrogen receptor regulatory activity has been linked to bone, brain and neural development in humans. We are committed to identifying the chemical structures of isopentyl phenols from different plant sources, exploring new compounds, evaluating their biological activities, and resolving structure-activity relationship and regulatory mechanism. On the other hand, by exploring natural enzyme genes, using synthetic biology theory and metabolic engineering technology to carry out basic research on the heterologous biosynthesis of isopentyl phenols, we aim to finally achieve their rapid and efficient synthesis and lay a foundation for the development of health food products.
