Abstract

Summary Xuanwei ham is a kind of traditional meat product with unique flavour along with abundant of bioactive peptides. This study was to investigate the in vitro stability of bioactive peptide extract from dry-cured Xuanwei hams and its anti-inflammatory effect in RAW264.7 cells. Firstly, the Xuanwei ham peptides (XHPs) were extracted and then tested in the lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced macrophage cell model. Furthermore, the XHPs were exposed to different pretreatments including heating, acid-base environment and simulated gastrointestinal digestion to evaluate their inflammatory regulation capacity. The heating temperature and pH did not show significant effects on the anti-inflammatory capacity of XHPs, whereas the secretion of NO and TNF-α was not suppressed after heating at 100 °C for 60 min. After digestion, the numbers of free amino acids and short peptides were enhanced significantly and the XHPs showed better inhibitory effect on LPS-induced NO and TNF-α secretion. Overall, the heating and pH treatment had no significant influence on the stability of XHPs but the anti-inflammatory effect was enhanced after the simulated gastrointestinal digestion along with the releasing of novel bioactive peptides.