ABSTRACT
The global trend toward healthier foods has led to a boom in the market of probiotics as a functional ingredient owing to their documented benefits. It has been established that the viability of probiotics is of utmost importance for exhibiting these benefits. The viability of probiotics is lost during the processes of product formulation, processing, storage, distribution, and gastric transit. Microencapsulation, especially spray drying encapsulation, is a common technique to retain the viability of probiotics required for extending their health benefits. Modulation of processing parameters, the selection of probiotic strains and coating materials, and stability during gastric transit are the major challenges that occur during the encapsulation of probiotics by the spray drying technique. In this chapter, we discuss how the proper selection of probiotic strains and wall materials, the modulation of technological parameters of spray drying, and storage conditions can yield spray dried encapsulated probiotics with greater viability.
