Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus: An Overview of the Viability in Fruit and Vegetable Juices and Their Potential Effects on Human Health.

Abstract

Consumer demand for health-enhancing foods is growing, with plant-based probiotic foods gaining prominence. Fruit and vegetable juices offer promising matrices for delivering probiotic strains due to their rich bioactive compound content, which holds nutritional and technological significance. Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus is commonly employed in viability studies, offering both technological benefits and potential health advantages for consumers. The main databases were searched to bring together a compilation of studies that assessed the feasibility and technological parameters of fruit and vegetable juices enriched with Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus. In addition, this review aims to analyze promising points, gaps, and challenges in the development of these products, such as the relationship between the technological aspect of manufacturing this type of food and impacts on human health. The strain most used in the studies was Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus GG. More than half of the formulations maintained viability above 8 log CFU/mL. Low pH, high dissolved oxygen concentrations, and low free amino acid concentrations can all be obstacles to preserving viability in fruit and vegetable juices. Various techniques, including microencapsulation, prebiotic supplementation, and pH adjustments, have been employed by researchers to achieve more favorable results. Despite numerous meta-analyses on supplementation alone, human studies on the consumption of probiotic-enriched juices remain scarce, which highlight the need for more research.