Danish Scientists Achieve Phosphorylation of Animal-Free Casein, Paving the Way for Better Dairy Alternatives

Danish scientists from the Technical University of Denmark have achieved the phosphorylation of animal-free casein, a crucial step in the production of dairy alternatives such as cheese. Previous attempts to phosphorylate caseins have been unsuccessful, but the researchers successfully produced phosphorylated caseins in Escherichia coli bacteria. They also developed a phosphomimetic strategy by substituting serine residues with aspartate to mimic phosphorylation.

The properties of the resulting caseins are comparable to bovine caseins in terms of calcium-binding affinity, digestibility, and structural integrity. This breakthrough in the alternative protein industry has the potential to transform the food system by providing a more sustainable and efficient source of proteins. Further research is needed to scale up animal-free casein production and integrate the ingredient into end products, but this development lays the foundation for producing functional recombinant caseins.