CHAPTER  ONE
INTRODUCTION
Definition:       Protein hydrolysate could be defined as the end product of protein hydrolysis using chemical and enzymic methods.
Protein hydrolysate have many uses in specialty foods such as non allergenic infant formular, diets foods and other special nutritional foods.
The drawback of many hydrolysates such as Soya or Casein hydrolysates is the bitter taste that develops when they are hydrolysated into small peptides with protease enzymes.
Protein maldigestion which is often associated with cystic fibrosis and allergy to milk protein may be overcome by replacing intact in the diet with synthetic amino acid mixture, or with enzymic protein hydrolysates. Hydrolysates may be the treatment of choice for two reasons. The amino acids and small peptides constituents of protein hydrolysates have been shown to be more readily ascribed from the small intestine than their equivelent pure amino acid mixture, more over, protein hydrolysates are considerably less expensive than synthetic amino acid mixtures. Nonetheless, protein hydrolysates suffer from a serious drawback, namely, the occurrence of a bitter taste which develops during the course of the enzymic hydrolysis.
Murray r (1952) demonstrated that a treatment of enzymic casein hydrolysates with activated carbon resulted in a substantial improvement in the taste of preparations. However, authors regarded this method of improving the taste as impractical due to the simultaneous loss of a large proportion of the hyptophan during treatment. A different approach was presented in move recent studies in which a casein hydrolysate relatively free of bitter taste was obtained by the sequential employment of papa in and of pig’s kidney homogenate – the latter serving as a source of exopeptidases. However, extended time periods of hydrolysis were required, which necessitated the use of dolor form to control bacterial growth.
There is a variety of food and biomedical applications for protein which have been solubilized by enzymatic hydrolysis. Their enhanced solubility, heat stability, and resistance to precipitation in acidic environs, where many proteins are insoluble, offer attractive features to biochemists and nutritionists involve the research and development of high protein food formulations.
Applications of these valuable protein supplements may have merit in the diet of persons with digestive disorders, pre and post operative abdominal surgical patient, geriatric and convalescent feeding , and for other who for various reasons do not ingest a well balanced diet. Unfortunately, the use of enzyme – treated hydrolysates in dietary food applications has in many instances, been limited due to the presence of bitter flovour component. The unpalatability of these hydrolysate  arises mainly from the formation of bitter peptide and amino acids liberated during the hydrolytic process. The bitterness appease to be closely related to the content and sequence of hydrophobic amino acids in the peptides.