Food industry companies have rather high expectations in food products that meet the consumers’ demand for a healthy life style. In this context, ‘functional foods’ play a specific role. These foods are not intended only to satisfy hunger and provide humans with necessary nutrients, but also to prevent nutrition-related diseases and increase physical and mental well-being of consumers (1-3). One of the most promising areas for the development of functional foods lies in the modification of gastrointestinal tract activity by the use of probiotics, prebiotics and synbiotics.
Probiotics are special types of live healthful bacteria or yeast which possess favorable impacts on animal and human host mainly via maintaining and/or improving microbial balance between harmful and beneficial microflora, especially in the intestine (4-6). They have an established role in reducing human illnesses, particularly gastrointestinal infections caused by deficient or compromised gut microflora. Other therapeutic functions are attributed to probiotics such as anti-cholesterol activity, alleviation of lactose intolerance symptoms, promotion of beneficial immune responses, antimicrobial impact, anti-high blood pressure effect and anticarcinogenic and anti-mutagenic activities (7-15). Recently, there have also been recent reports on the potential benefit of probiotics for human skin (16) and against colds and flu (17).