Unlocking the potential of umami peptides: A comprehensive review of preparation methods, evaluation strategies, health benefits, and taste transduction mechanisms.

Current technologies make it difficult to achieve high-throughput screening and standardized evaluation of umami peptides. Besides, the conformational mechanisms involved in activation of umami receptor are not fully elucidated, which greatly limits further development of umami peptides. Therefore, this review systematically summarized the taste characteristics, functional properties, efficient preparation techniques, evaluation methods and taste transduction mechanisms of umami peptides. The application of multi-omics technology, molecular simulation, especially deep learning in high-throughput screening of umami peptides shows significant advantages. Additionally, cellular and animal models, taste-bud biosensors, and electroencephalography were effective methods to evaluate the taste characteristics of umami peptides. Moreover, obtaining complete umami receptor by heterologous expression and combined with cryo-EM, single-molecule FRET, three-dimensional variability analysis, multispectral techniques, and advances MDS will help to deeply understand the binding mechanisms of umami peptides and receptor. This review provides new directions for the development, utilization and healthfulness of umami peptides in food industry.