INTRODUCTION
The food industry is being rapidly developed. At the same time, the competition between manufacturers is escalating. The manufacturers strive to anticipate the customer needs by paying ever-increasing attention to the quality of products and introducing advanced tech-nologies. The perception and attitude of consumers to food products have a huge impact on the sales of the products. These requirements have led to the formula-tion of a new generation of foodstuffs that favorably affect the human body [1, 2].
The most important curative measure aimed at re-ducing the adverse effects of physical, chemical, and biological factors of the environment on human health is the use of pectin preparations approved by the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation in the healthful and dietary meals of all groups of the population.
Pectins are widely used in all sectors of the food in-dustry. Pectin is a purified hydrocarbon obtained by extraction from plant raw materials. Pectins are used as gelling, stabilizing, thickening, water-retaining, and clarifying agents, as substances facilitating filtering, and as a means for encapsulation. For example, in the dairy industry, pectins are actively used in the manufacture of yogurts, cheese, ice cream, milkfruit desserts, and fermented and acidified dairy products; pectins are used as an emulsifier for the manufacture of mayonnaise and liquid margarines in the fat-and-oil industry. Pectins are successfully used for the production of marmalade, jelly fillings, whipped confectionery products, such as marshmallows and pastille, and candy pastes.
In the European system of codification of food additives, pectin has the number E440.
According to the current nomenclature, pectic sub-stances include protopectin, pectin, pectinic acid and pectinates, pectic acid and pectates [3].
• Protopectin is water-insoluble natural pectin with a complex structure, which has not yet been precisely specified. It is believed that its composition includes all the above complexes.
• Pectin, or soluble pectin—water-soluble polyga-lacturonic acids methoxylated to varying degrees—is formed from protopectin under the action of acids, alkalis, or protopectinase enzyme.
• Pectinic acid is macromolecular polygalacturonic acid with carboxyl groups partially etherified with methanol. Salts of pectinic acid are referred to as pectinates.
• Pectic acid results from complete demethoxyla-tion of pectinic acid. The solubility of pectic acid is lower than that of pectinic acid. Salts of pectic acid are referred to as pectates.
The main functional feature of pectin as a gelling agent is the ability to form gels in aqueous solutions in the presence of a certain amount of sugar and acid or calcium ions. In addition, pectin can absorb and rid the body of biogenic toxins, anabolic steroids, xenobiotics, metabolites, and biologically harmful substances capa-ble of accumulating in the body [4-6].
