Screening and spray drying of enzymes and probiotics

Many food ingredients, such as enzymes and probiotics, are spray dried to provide a longer shelf life. A major hurdle when applying spray drying is the extensive optimisa tion required for formulation and drying conditions to obtain powders of acceptable quality. Therefore, a high-throughput screening platform based on single droplet drying mimicking spray drying was successfully developed. It allows, in combination with a novel viability enumeration technique, screening amongst others survival percentages of probiotic bacteria as a function of drying conditions and formulation.