Applications of Infrared and Raman Spectroscopies to Probiotic Investigation

• Main Authors: Mauricio I. Santos, Esteban Gerbino, Elizabeth Tymczyszyn, Andrea Gomez-Zavaglia
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2015-07-01
• Series: Foods
• Subjects: FTIR (Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy); NIR (near infrared spectroscopy); Raman spectroscopy; probiotics; multivariate analysis
• Online Access: http://www.mdpi.com/2304-8158/4/3/283

In this review, we overview the most important contributions of vibrational spectroscopy based techniques in the study of probiotics and lactic acid bacteria. First, we briefly introduce the fundamentals of these techniques, together with the main multivariate analytical tools used for spectral interpretation. Then, four main groups of applications are reported: (a) bacterial taxonomy (Subsection 4.1); (b) bacterial preservation (Subsection 4.2); (c) monitoring processes involving lactic acid bacteria and probiotics (Subsection 4.3); (d) imaging-based applications (Subsection 4.4). A final conclusion, underlying the potentialities of these techniques, is presented.