Encapsulation in the Food Industry: A Brief Historical Overview to Recent Developments

Encapsulation in food industry serves several\r\nfunctions including masking of undesirable color/flavor/taste, preservation of\r\nunstable constituents, incorporation of\r\nadditional functional and nutritional components and site-specific release of encapsulated ingredients at a controlled time and rate. The\r\nknowledge of microencapsulation in other sectors like pharmaceutical industry\r\nis well advanced; however, more understanding is required to harvest the\r\nmaximum benefits from food industry. This paper started with highlighting the\r\ngradual progress of microencapsulation process in food industry and ended up\r\nwith some invaluable suggestions for future works. In the body, the paper\r\nreviews the major techniques of food encapsulation, choices of coating\r\nmaterials and the performance measurement methods of food encapsulation. Future\r\ntrends, scopes and aspects of microencapsulation process in food manufacturing\r\nsector are also presented as the necessary recommendations for future\r\nresearches. The article would help the microencapsulated food manufacturers to\r\nchoose the target oriented encapsulates and suitable encapsulation technique.