foods Article Stability of Fucoxanthin in Pasteurized Skim and Whole Goat Milk Maryuri T. Nuñez de González, Rahmat Attaie *, Adela Mora-Gutierrez, Selamawit Woldesenbet and Yoonsung Jung   Citation: Nuñez de González, M.T.; Attaie, R.; Mora-Gutierrez, A.; Woldesenbet, S.; Jung, Y. Stability of Fucoxanthin in Pasteurized Skim and Whole Goat Milk. Foods 2021, 10, 1647. https://doi.org/10.3390/ foods10071647 Academic Editor: Giorgos Markou Received: 14 June 2021 Accepted: 14 July 2021 Published: 16 July 2021 Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affil- iations. Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/). Cooperative Agricultural Research Center, Prairie View A&M University, Prairie View, TX 77446, USA; mtnunez@pvamu.edu (M.T.N.d.G.); admora@pvamu.edu (A.M.-G.); sewoldesenbet@pvamu.edu (S.W.); yojung@pvamu.edu (Y.J.) * Correspondence: rattaie@pvamu.edu; Tel.: +1-936-261-5004; Fax: +1-936-261-9975 Abstract: Obesity has become a worldwide problem giving rise to several health issues. Fucoxanthin, a marine carotenoid with anti-obesity activity, has potential application as a biofunctional ingredient in human food. The objective of this study was to evaluate the thermal stability of fucoxanthin at pasteurization temperature and, subsequently, its storage stability in goat whole milk (WM) and skim milk (SM) at refrigeration temperature for four weeks. Additionally, the effect of supplementation of fucoxanthin on the composition of milk, pH, acidity, color, and lipid oxidation of WM and SM was evaluated during the four week storage period. Fresh goat WM and SM were supplemented with fucoxanthin at a concentration of 10.67 μg/mL (2.56 mg/240 mL of milk, one serving), pasteurized at 64 ◦ C for 30 min and stored at 4 ◦ C for four weeks. The quantification of fucoxanthin in WM and SM was performed every week using a HPLC method. Moreover, the effect of supplementation of fucoxanthin on the composition of WM and SM was evaluated by a LactiCheck milk analyzer, and the color was evaluated by reflectance using a HunterLab colorimeter. Lipid oxidation, as the 2-thiobarbituric acid-reactive substances (TBARS) at A 532 , was determined using a Spectramax Plus spectrophotometer during storage. Data were analyzed by a split-plot design using PROC MIXED of SAS. The recovery yields of fucoxanthin from the pasteurized WM and SM were 96.17 ± 1.5 % and 96.89 ± 1.5 %, respectively. Both milks exhibited high recovery yields of fucoxanthin. Fucoxanthin was stable in goat WM and SM during storage at 4 ◦ C for four weeks. The addition of fucoxanthin, at the concentration reported to have an anti-obesity effect in humans, to pasteurized WM and SM did not affect the composition or the physicochemical properties of milks but influenced the color, especially increasing the yellowness in the samples. These results revealed that goat milk can be used as a suitable matrix for the supplementation of fucoxanthin as a biofunctional ingredient in human foods. Keywords: goat milk; fucoxanthin; pasteurization; storage time 1. Introduction Consumers have an increased interest in nutrition as foods have been linked to health and wellness, primarily in the control of obesity. Obesity is associated with some of the most costly and serious health problems, such as type-2 diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and metabolic syndrome [1]. Based on the National Health and Nutrition Survey (NHANES), the prevalence of obesity in U.S. youth and adults was 18.5 and 39.8%, respectively, in 2015–2016 [2]. Since obesity continues to be an important health problem, developing effective preventive measures to reduce obesity and ease the medical and economic burden of obesity-related diseases such as cancer, heart disease, and diabetes, which amounts to billions of dollars annually, is essential. Nutrition can play a major role in preventing these lifestyle-related diseases and it is highly desirable to find safe and effective biofunctional ingredients in food to mitigate these health-related issues [3]. Foods 2021, 10, 1647. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods10071647 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/foods