AI model predicts peptide bitterness and enables novel flavor design

During the production of fermented products such as kefir, Parmesan, or mountain cheese, as well as in the production of protein powders, bitter-tasting peptides can form, which impair the taste and thus the acceptability of the products. A research team led by the Leibniz Institute for Food Systems Biology at the Technical University of Munich has now developed and successfully tested an AI-based method that can predict the bitterness of peptides. It also makes it possible to design new, bitter-tasting peptides from scratch. This is another important step forward in taste and food research.