Eleocharis dulcis, a plant with both medicinal and culinary uses, is rich in a variety of bioactive components, including polyphenols, polysaccharides, and its unique component, puchiin. These constituents confer E. dulcis antioxidant, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, and anticancer properties, highlighting its potential in functional foods and pharmaceuticals. Therefore, exploring the nutritional components of E. dulcis based on their functional characteristics and developing E. dulcis-based functional foods have become research hotspots recently. This article systematically introduces the biological activities and nutritional and functional factors of E. dulcis based on its dietary and medicinal values and reviews the existing types of E. dulcis products, aiming to provide references for the deep processing, comprehensive utilization and product development of E. dulcis.

Ovotransferrin (OVT) is a functional iron-binding egg protein with abundant nutritional value and a wide range of functional properties, which can be applied in a variety of food systems. Moreover, it is an ideal alternative to lactoferrin. The structure and physicochemical properties of OVT affect the performance of egg white in food processing, and the changes in its physicochemical properties are usually related to structural changes. This article reviews various purification and separation methods for OVT. The iron-binding sites and the mechanism of iron release are explained by comparing the tertiary structures of the apo and holo forms of OVT, and the phosphorylation and glycosylation modification sites of OVT are summarized. The relationship between physicochemical properties of OVT and its structural changes is discussed. Various biological activities of OVT and its application in the food and medical industries are described. In addition to being used as a natural food preservative, immunomodulator, and functional food ingredient beneficial to human health, OVT also shows great potential in preparing food-grade carriers to improve the bioavailability of nutritional and active ingredients. Finally, the challenges and future directions of OVT research are provided.

Hen’s eggs are delicious in taste, have high nutritional value, are easily absorbed by the human body, being an important food source for humans and a low-cost raw material for food processing. However, eggs are one of the most common food allergens, and the incidence of egg allergy among infants and young children is the second highest next only to milk and has gradually risen in recent years, which not only causes great physical and mental pain and living burdens for allergy sufferers, but also poses considerable safety risks to the food processing industry. Identification of egg allergens and their epitopes, as well as development of eco-friendly and efficient techniques for allergenicity reduction has become a focal research area in the global food science community. This article elaborates on the major egg allergens and their epitopes, and summarizes the effects of physical, chemical and biological allergenicity reduction techniques as well as their combination on reducing the allergenicity of egg allergens, with the aim of providing new ideas for the development of technologies for reducing the allergenicity of egg allergens and the utilization of egg resources.