The evolution of pork myosin aggregates and the relationship between aggregation modes and microstructures of O/W emulsions

Abstract To fabricate pork myosin nano-aggregates and investigate the effect of aggregation modes on emulsified gels, the surface charge, aggregate size, characteristic morphology, protein conformation, chemical forces and microstructures were measured at different pHs and ionic strength during the heat treatment of 75 °C for 30 min. The results showed three kinds of aggregation modes were formed, including fibril aggregation, amorphous aggregation and hydrogel aggregation, in which the characteristic morphology of myosin aggregates was fibrous strand-like, spongy, hippocampus-like and network-like, respectively. The flexible filaments were formed with higher positive charges and larger sizes at pH 3.0, and in contrast at pH 9.0 the hydrogel was formed with higher negative charges and smaller sizes. As the morphology changed from fibrous strand-like to network-like, α-helix significantly increased but β-sheet, β-turn and random coil significantly decreased (P