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NutrInsight • Satiety: from appetite sciences to food application
2.2 Two examples of application
Screening food prototypes (the BISENS academic project)
The BISENS project was a French program aimed at designing a biscuit with a high satiety power, including mechanism of actions related to these complex regulations. Cereal product prototypes were designed by the food industry in order to maximise the satiating efficiency of various ingredients. For example fibres and proteins are known to exert a strong effect on satiety and their combination in a particular food may have interesting properties. Finding the optimal combination is critical before launching large scale clinical trials.
In the BISENS study, three types of fibre, six types of proteins, and five combinations of fibre and proteins were compared for their satiety value according to ratings obtained from a “satiety expert group”. Fifteen cereal product prototypes enriched in fibre and/or proteins were developed.
An appetite score was obtained from an expert panel (n=16) for the sensations experienced up to 170 minutes following the ingestion of the 15 prototypes at breakfast. A clear product effect was detected, and it was possible to identify low versus high satiety prototypes. In particular, it was possible to discriminate the satiety effects of one control prototype, high fibre prototypes, high protein prototypes, and prototypes rich in both fibre and protein.
Among the 15 prototypes, 4 products were selected to be tested at a larger scale. When a group of 56 untrained individuals participating in the clinical trial were asked to rate appetite sensations following the intake of the 4 selected prototypes, it appeared that their ratings were close to those of the expert group for the control, high-fibre, and high-fibre high-protein prototypes. The expert group appeared more sensitive than the non-expert group to the satiating effect of protein enriched products.
This comparison of expert versus non-expert groups suggests that experts might respond differently to certain characteristics of foods. In addition to nutrient content, such factors as palatability might also lead to different responses between the untrained public and experts specifically trained to analyse sensory properties. Further research will be needed in order to compare and understand potential differences in the responsiveness of “satiety experts” and the general public.
Studying the impact of macronutrients on appetite scores
The current database developed by the nutrition research team at Mondele- z International contains 50 cereal products with varying contents of proteins and fibres, and differing in important dimensions such as volume. The “satiety expert panel” participated in the assessment of the satiety efficiency of these foods based on these dimensions. Figure 3 illustrates the strong satiety effects of protein and fibre content in cereal products. Higher protein content decreases the appetite score, i.e. increases satiety, and this effect is high both at 20 and 170 minutes after ingestion. Higher fibre content is also associated with higher satiety, an effect that becomes particularly clear in the late phases of the post-meal interval. High volume of food ingested also increases satiety but to a much lesser extent than the protein and fibre contents.
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