Decoding Bioactivity in Food: Structural Insights and Analytical Challenges

Food science has increasingly recognized the importance of bioactive compounds for both nutritional value and health promotion. These compounds, including phenolics, carotenoids, tocopherols, terpenes, complex lipids, and phytosterols, are either intrinsic to food or added as functional ingredients. While various in vitro and in vivo studies have demonstrated their antioxidant, antimicrobial, and health-supporting activities, understanding how their chemical structure determines bioactivity remains a central challenge. Recent research highlights the complexity of associating structure with specific biological effects, especially considering changes during food processing and matrices. Ongoing debates focus on the relationships between molecular structure, stability, sensory properties, and the physiological responses elicited by these compounds and their metabolites, with significant gaps remaining in linking compositional changes to tangible health outcomes.Efforts in this field increasingly rely on sophisticated analytical methods to characterize and quantify bioactive compounds, identify metabolites, and trace transformations during food processing and digestion. Current studies underscore that extraction techniques, structural modifications, and interactions with other food components critically influence bioavailability and function. Despite advances, reliably decoding how structure governs bioactivity in real food systems is hindered by analytical limitations and the need for sensitive, selective, and reproducible methodologies. A comprehensive understanding is essential to design foods with optimized health benefits, yet more robust links between analytical characterization, structure-activity relationships, and physiological outcomes are urgently needed.This Research Topic aims to unravel the complex interactions between food bioactive compound structures and their corresponding activities. We welcome articles addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:- Structural elucidation and characterization of food bioactive compounds- Advances in analytical techniques for assessing stability, bioaccessibility, and bioavailability- Structure-activity relationship studies in vitro, in vivo, and in silico- Impact of food processing and packaging on bioactive compound functionality- Systems biology and metabolomics approaches to food bioactivity- Sensory, nutritional, and physiological consequences of functional ingredients and their metabolites- Methodological innovations for extraction, characterization, and quantification. Topic editors: Ariel Fontana, Francesco Capozzi, Amélia M. Silva Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/72379/decoding-bioactivity-in-food-structural-insights-and-analytical-challenges