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On the valorization of lactose and its derivatives from cheese whey as a dairy industry by-product: an overview

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Abstract

The resulting whey from cheese manufacture consists mainly of water and lactose, a sugar with little sweetening and fermentable power and low commercial value. Aiming at valorizing the whey and faced with the challenge to reduce and treat an industrial wastewater present at high volumes and composed of high organic load, several ways to enhance the commercial value lactose have been sought. Thanks to the functional and technological traits of lactose and to the biotechnological advances, several applications have been proposed either for direct use or for the production and application of chemical and enzymatic derivatives or by-products from microbiological processes. Nowadays, lactose has numerous potential applications in food, feed, nutraceutical, pharmaceutical and cosmetic industry, an overview of which is given in this review. On the other hand, many compounds of high added value are produced from lactose, such as oligosaccharides with prebiotic properties, lactobionic acid with antioxidant properties, lactitol as sweetener with dietetic and prebiotic functions, and lactulose as prebiotic ingredient. Nevertheless, the implementation of industrial processes for whey collection and lactose recovery and valorization faces practical difficulties, particularly of logistical and financial investment nature. This communication aims at giving an overview with respect to the problems associated with the high volumes of whey produced in the dairy industry and some of the foremost technological routes for its commercial exploitation through the use of lactose and its derivatives. It also presents a set of considerations regarding the main bottlenecks to overcome towards the creation and implementation of integrated systems tailored for collecting and processing cheese whey in an efficient, sustainable and cost-effective approach.

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Acknowledgments

This work is based upon the work from COST Action 18101 SOURDOMICS – Sourdough biotechnology network towards novel, healthier and sustainable food and bioprocesses (https://sourdomics.com/; https://www.cost.eu/actions/CA18101/), where the author J.M.R. is the Chair and Grant Holder Scientific Representative and is supported by COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) (https://www.cost.eu/). COST is a funding agency for research and innovation networks. The authors have no conflicts of interest whatsoever to declare.

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  1. Departamento de Química e Bioquímica, REQUIMTE – Rede de Química e Tecnologia, Laboratório de Química Verde (LAQV), Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade do Porto (FCUP), Porto, Portugal

    João M. Rocha

  2. Bjerstedvej 25B, 4460, Snerting, Denmark

    Alexandra Guerra

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Individual contributions from authors to this manuscript were as follows. Author J.M.R. contributed to the conceptualization, methodology, writing—original draft preparation, writing—review and editing, visualization, supervision and validation. Author M.A.G. contributed to the conceptualization, writing—original draft preparation and validation.

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Rocha, J.M., Guerra, A. On the valorization of lactose and its derivatives from cheese whey as a dairy industry by-product: an overview. Eur Food Res Technol 246, 2161–2174 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00217-020-03580-2

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