Portal:Food science
Portal maintenance status: (October 2018)
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Introduction
Food science is the applied science devoted to the study of food. The Institute of Food Technologists defines food science as "the discipline in which the engineering, biological, and physical sciences are used to study the nature of foods, the causes of deterioration, the principles underlying food processing, and the improvement of foods for the consuming public". The textbook Food Science defines food science in simpler terms as "the application of basic sciences and engineering to study the physical, chemical, and biochemical nature of foods and the principles of food processing".
Activities of food scientists include the development of new food products, design of processes to produce these foods, choice of packaging materials, shelf-life studies, sensory evaluation of products using survey panels or potential consumers, as well as microbiological and chemical testing. Food scientists may study more fundamental phenomena that are directly linked to the production of food products and its properties.
Selected general articles
- Nutrition is the science that interprets the interaction of nutrients and other substances in food in relation to maintenance, growth, reproduction, health and disease of an organism. It includes food intake, absorption, assimilation, biosynthesis, catabolism, and excretion.
The diet of an organism is what it eats, which is largely determined by the availability and palatability of foods. For humans, a healthy diet includes preparation of food and storage methods that preserve nutrients from oxidation, heat or leaching, and that reduce risk of foodborne illnesses. Read more... - Food processing is the transformation of agricultural products into food, or of one form of food into other forms. Food processing includes many forms of processing foods, from grinding grain to make raw flour to home cooking to complex industrial methods used to make convenience foods.
Industrial cheese production
Primary food processing is necessary to make most foods edible, and secondary food processing turns the ingredients into familiar foods, such as bread. Read more... - Food security is a condition related to the availability of food, and individuals' accessibility and affordability to it. There is evidence of being in use over 10,000 years ago, with central authorities in civilizations ancient China and ancient Egypt being known to release food from storage in times of famine. At the 1974 World Food Conference the term "food security" was defined with an emphasis on supply. Food security, they said, is the "availability at all times of adequate, nourishing, diverse, balanced and moderate world food supplies of basic foodstuffs to sustain a steady expansion of food consumption and to offset fluctuations in production and prices". Later definitions added demand and access issues to the definition. The final report of the 1996 World Food Summit states that food security "exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life".
Household food security exists when all members, at all times, have access to enough food for an active, healthy life. Individuals who are food secure do not live in hunger or fear of starvation. Food insecurity, on the other hand, is a situation of "limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods or limited or uncertain ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways", according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Food security incorporates a measure of resilience to future disruption or unavailability of critical food supply due to various risk factors including droughts, shipping disruptions, fuel shortages, economic instability, and wars.
In the years 2011–2013, an estimated 842 million people were suffering from chronic hunger. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, or FAO, identified the four pillars of food security as availability, access, utilization, and stability. The United Nations (UN) recognized the Right to Food in the Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, and has since noted that it is vital for the enjoyment of all other rights. Read more... - Overnutrition or hyperalimentation is a form of malnutrition in which the intake of nutrients is oversupplied. The amount of nutrients exceeds the amount required for normal growth, development, and metabolism.
The term can also refer to:- Obesity, which occurs by eating more calories than one burns, as well as:
- Oversupplying a specific nutrient, such as dietary minerals or vitamin poisoning. This is due to an excessive intake or a nutritional imbalance caused by fad diets.
Food marketing brings together the food producer and the consumer through a chain of marketing activities. Read more...
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA or USFDA) is a federal agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, one of the United States federal executive departments. The FDA is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the control and supervision of food safety, tobacco products, dietary supplements, prescription and over-the-counter pharmaceutical drugs (medications), vaccines, biopharmaceuticals, blood transfusions, medical devices, electromagnetic radiation emitting devices (ERED), cosmetics, animal foods & feed and veterinary products. As of 2017, 3/4th of the FDA budget (approximately $700 million) is funded by the pharmaceutical companies due to the Prescription Drug User Fee Act.
The FDA was empowered by the United States Congress to enforce the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, which serves as the primary focus for the Agency; the FDA also enforces other laws, notably Section 361 of the Public Health Service Act and associated regulations, many of which are not directly related to food or drugs. These include regulating lasers, cellular phones, condoms and control of disease on products ranging from certain household pets to sperm donation for assisted reproduction. Read more...- Sensory analysis (or sensory evaluation) is a scientific discipline that applies principles of experimental design and statistical analysis to the use of human senses (sight, smell, taste, touch and hearing) for the purposes of evaluating consumer products. The discipline requires panels of human assessors, on whom the products are tested, and recording the responses made by them. By applying statistical techniques to the results it is possible to make inferences and insights about the products under test. Most large consumer goods companies have departments dedicated to sensory analysis.
Sensory analysis can mainly be broken down into three sub-sections:- Analytical testing (dealing with objective facts about products)
- Affective testing (dealing with subjective facts such as preferences)
- Perception (the biochemical and psychological aspects of sensation)
- A processing aid is a substance used in the production of processed food, and which may end up in the finished product, but which is not, by law, required to be disclosed to the consumer as an ingredient. Read more...
- Food processing is the transformation of agricultural products into food, or of one form of food into other forms. Food processing includes many forms of processing foods, from grinding grain to make raw flour to home cooking to complex industrial methods used to make convenience foods.
Industrial cheese production
Primary food processing is necessary to make most foods edible, and secondary food processing turns the ingredients into familiar foods, such as bread. Read more... - The National Drug Authority (NDA) is a government-owned organisation in Uganda, mandated to regulate drugs in the country, including their manufacture, importation, distribution, and licensing. Read more...
- Foodservice (US English) or catering industry (British English) defines those businesses, institutions, and companies responsible for any meal prepared outside the home. This industry includes restaurants, school and hospital cafeterias, catering operations, and many other formats.
The companies that supply foodservice operators are called foodservice distributors. Foodservice distributors sell goods like small wares (kitchen utensils) and foods. Some companies manufacture products in both consumer and foodservice versions. The consumer version usually comes in individual-sized packages with elaborate label design for retail sale. The foodservice version is packaged in a much larger industrial size and often lacks the colorful label designs of the consumer version. Read more...
An orange ribbon—the awareness ribbon for malnutrition.
Malnutrition is a condition that results from eating a diet in which one or more nutrients are either not enough or are too much such that the diet causes health problems. It may involve calories, protein, carbohydrates, vitamins or minerals. Not enough nutrients is called undernutrition or undernourishment while too much is called overnutrition. Malnutrition is often used to specifically refer to undernutrition where an individual is not getting enough calories, protein, or micronutrients. If undernutrition occurs during pregnancy, or before two years of age, it may result in permanent problems with physical and mental development. Extreme undernourishment, known as starvation, may have symptoms that include: a short height, thin body, very poor energy levels, and swollen legs and abdomen. People also often get infections and are frequently cold. The symptoms of micronutrient deficiencies depend on the micronutrient that is lacking.
Undernourishment is most often due to not enough high-quality food being available to eat. This is often related to high food prices and poverty. A lack of breastfeeding may contribute, as may a number of infectious diseases such as: gastroenteritis, pneumonia, malaria, and measles, which increase nutrient requirements. There are two main types of undernutrition: protein-energy malnutrition and dietary deficiencies. Protein-energy malnutrition has two severe forms: marasmus (a lack of protein and calories) and kwashiorkor (a lack of just protein). Common micronutrient deficiencies include: a lack of iron, iodine, and vitamin A. During pregnancy, due to the body's increased need, deficiencies may become more common. In some developing countries, overnutrition in the form of obesity is beginning to present within the same communities as undernutrition. Other causes of malnutrition include anorexia nervosa and bariatric surgery. Read more...
A selection of plant-sourced food consumed by humans. The human diet can vary widely.
In nutrition, diet is the sum of food consumed by a person or other organism.
The word diet often implies the use of specific intake of nutrition for health or weight-management reasons (with the two often being related). Although humans are omnivores, each culture and each person holds some food preferences or some food taboos. This may be due to personal tastes or ethical reasons. Individual dietary choices may be more or less healthy.
Complete nutrition requires ingestion and absorption of vitamins, minerals, essential amino acids from protein and essential fatty acids from fat-containing food, also food energy in the form of carbohydrate, protein, and fat. Dietary habits and choices play a significant role in the quality of life, health and longevity. Read more...
Food engineering is a multidisciplinary field which combines microbiology, applied physical sciences, chemistry and engineering for food and related industries. Food engineering includes, but is not limited to, the application of agricultural engineering, mechanical engineering and chemical engineering principles to food materials. Food engineers provide the technological knowledge transfer essential to the cost-effective production and commercialization of food products and services. Physics, chemistry, and mathematics are fundamental to understanding and engineering products and operations in the food industry.
Food engineering encompasses a wide range of activities. Food engineers are employed in food processing, food machinery, packaging, ingredient manufacturing, instrumentation, and control. Firms that design and build food processing plants, consulting firms, government agencies, pharmaceutical companies, and health-care firms also employ food engineers. Specific food engineering activities include: Read more...- Discrimination testing is a technique employed in sensory analysis to determine whether there is a detectable difference among two or more products. The test uses a group of assessors (panellists) with a degree of training appropriate to the complexity of the test (see also: trained panel) to discriminate from one product to another through one of a variety of experimental designs. Though useful, these tests typically do not quantify or describe any differences, requiring a more specifically trained panel under different study design to describe differences and assess significance of the difference. Read more...
The National Agriculture and Food Research Organization (農業・食品産業技術総合研究機構, Nōgyō Shokuhin Sangyō Gijutsu Sōgō Kenkyū Kikō, NARO), is a Japanese research facility headquartered in Tsukuba Science City, Ibaraki, and the workforce is located in Tsukuba and in several cities and towns throughout Japan. The organization is dedicated to scientific research related to Agriculture. It became a new legal body of Independent Administrative Institution in 2001 originally as National Agricultural Research Organization, remaining under the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF). Read more...
A famine is a widespread scarcity of food, caused by several factors including war, inflation, crop failure, population imbalance, or government policies. This phenomenon is usually accompanied or followed by regional malnutrition, starvation, epidemic, and increased mortality. Every inhabited continent in the world has experienced a period of famine throughout history. In the 19th and 20th century, it was generally Southeast and South Asia, as well as Eastern and Central Europe that suffered the most deaths from famine. The numbers dying from famine began to fall sharply from the 2000s.
Some countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, continue to have extreme cases of famine. Since 2010, Africa has been the most affected continent in the world. As of 2017, the United Nations has warned some 20 million are at risk in South Sudan, Somalia, Nigeria and Yemen. Agricultural conditions have been fluctuating more and more due to variations in weather, and the distribution of food has been affected by conflict. Most programmes now direct their aid towards Africa. Read more...
The textural properties of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich
Food rheology is the study of the rheological properties of food, that is, the consistency and flow of food under tightly specified conditions. The consistency, degree of fluidity, and other mechanical properties are important in understanding how long food can be stored, how stable it will remain, and in determining food texture. The acceptability of food products to the consumer is often determined by food texture, such as how spreadable and creamy a food product is. Food rheology is important in quality control during food manufacture and processing. Food rheology terms have been noted since ancient times. In ancient Egypt bakers judged the consistency of dough by rolling it in their hands. Read more...
Hives on the back are a common allergy symptom.
A food allergy is an abnormal immune response to food. The symptoms of the allergic reaction may range from mild to severe. They may include itchiness, swelling of the tongue, vomiting, diarrhea, hives, trouble breathing, or low blood pressure. This typically occurs within minutes to several hours of exposure. When the symptoms are severe, it is known as anaphylaxis. Food intolerance and food poisoning are separate conditions.
Common foods involved include cow's milk, peanuts, eggs, shellfish, fish, tree nuts, soy, wheat, rice, and fruit. The common allergies vary depending on the country. Risk factors include a family history of allergies, vitamin D deficiency, obesity, and high levels of cleanliness. Allergies occur when immunoglobulin E (IgE), part of the body's immune system, binds to food molecules. A protein in the food is usually the problem. This triggers the release of inflammatory chemicals such as histamine. Diagnosis is usually based on a medical history, elimination diet, skin prick test, blood tests for food-specific IgE antibodies, or oral food challenge. Read more...
Food storage allows food to be eaten for some time (typically weeks to months) after harvest rather than solely immediately. It is both a traditional domestic skill and, in the form of food logistics, an important industrial and commercial activity. Food preservation, storage, and transport, including timely delivery to consumers, are important to food security, especially for the majority of people throughout the world who rely on others to produce their food. Food is stored by almost every human society and by many animals. Storing of food has several main purposes:- Storage of harvested and processed plant and animal food products for distribution to consumers
- Enabling a better balanced diet throughout the year
- Reducing kitchen waste by preserving unused or uneaten food for later use
- Preserving pantry food, such as spices or dry ingredients like rice and flour, for eventual use in cooking
- Preparedness for catastrophes, emergencies and periods of food scarcity or famine
- Religious reasons (Example: LDS Church leaders instruct church members to store food)
- Protection from animals or theft
- Clinical nutrition is nutrition of patients in health care. Clinical in this sense refers to the management of patients, including not only outpatients at clinics, but also (and mainly) inpatients in hospitals. It incorporates primarily the scientific fields of nutrition and dietetics. It aims to keep a healthy energy balance in patients, as well as providing sufficient amounts other nutrients such as protein, vitamins, minerals. Read more...
In international politics, food power is the use of agriculture as a means of political control whereby one nation or group of nations offers or withholds commodities from another nation or group of nations in order to manipulate behavior. Its potential use as a weapon was recognised after OPEC’s earlier use of oil as a political weapon. Food has a major influence on political actions of a nation. In response to acts of food power, a nation usually acts in the interest of its citizens to provide food.
Food power is an integral part of the politics of food. The idea of food power is used in embargoes, employment, and food politics. In order for a nation to utilize food power effectively, the nation must effectively apply and display scarcity, supply concentration, demand dispersion, and action independence. The four main nations that export enough agriculture to be able to exert food power are the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. On the smaller scale, particularly in some African countries, food power has been used as a weapon by opposing sides in internal wars and conflicts against their own people. Read more...- Food quality is the quality characteristics of food that is acceptable to consumers. This includes external factors as appearance (size, shape, colour, gloss, and consistency), texture, and flavour; factors such as federal grade standards (e.g. of eggs) and internal (chemical, physical, microbial).
Food quality in the United States is enforced by the Food Safety Act 1990. Members of the public complain to trading standards professionals,[specify] who submit complaint samples and also samples used to routinely monitor the food marketplace to public analysts. Public analysts carry out scientific analysis on the samples to determine whether the quality is of sufficient standard. Read more...
Food technology is a branch of food science that deals with the production processes that make foods.
Early scientific research into food technology concentrated on food preservation. Nicolas Appert’s development in 1810 of the canning process was a decisive event. The process wasn’t called canning then and Appert did not really know the principle on which his process worked, but canning has had a major impact on food preservation techniques. Read more...- The International Association for Food Protection (IAFP), founded in 1911, is a non-profit association of food safety professionals based in Des Moines, Iowa. The organization claims a membership of over 3,000 members from 50 nations. The mission of the IAFP is to provide food safety professionals worldwide with a forum to exchange information on protecting the food supply.
The Association provides its members with an information network on scientific, technical, and practical developments in food safety and sanitation through its two scientific journals, Food Protection Trends and Journal of Food Protection, its educational Annual Meeting, and interaction with other food safety professionals. Read more...
Food packaging is packaging for food. A package provides protection, tampering resistance, and special physical, chemical, or biological needs. It may bear a nutrition facts label and other information about food being offered for sale. Read more...- Food microbiology is the study of the microorganisms that inhibit, create, or contaminate food, including the study of microorganisms causing food spoilage, pathogens that may cause disease especially if food is improperly cooked or stored, those used to produce fermented foods such as cheese, yogurt, bread, beer, and wine, and those with other useful roles such as producing probiotics. Read more...
FAO emblem with its Latin motto, Fiat panis ("Let there be bread")
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO; French: Organisation des Nations unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture, Italian: Organizzazione delle Nazioni Unite per l'Alimentazione e l'Agricoltura) is a specialized agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger. Serving both developed and developing countries, FAO acts as a neutral forum where all nations meet as equals to negotiate arguments and debate policy.
FAO is also a source of knowledge and information, and helps developing countries in transition modernize and improve agriculture, forestry and fisheries practices, ensuring good nutrition and food security for all. Its Latin motto, fiat panis, translates as "let there be bread". , The FAO has 197 member states, including the European Union (a "member organization"), Niue and The Cook Islands (States in free-association with New Zealand), and the Faroe Islands and Tokelau, which are associate members. Read more...- Food fortification or enrichment is the process of adding micronutrients (essential trace elements and vitamins) to food. Sometimes it's a purely commercial choice to provide extra nutrients in a food, while other times it is a public health policy which aims to reduce the number of people with dietary deficiencies within a population. Staple foods of a region can lack particular nutrients due to the soil of the region or from inherent inadequacy of a normal diet. Addition of micronutrients to staples and condiments can prevent large-scale deficiency diseases in these cases.
As defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), fortification refers to "the practice of deliberately increasing the content of an essential micronutrient, ie. vitamins and minerals (including trace elements) in a food irrespective of whether the nutrients were originally in the food before processing or not, so as to improve the nutritional quality of the food supply and to provide a public health benefit with minimal risk to health", whereas enrichment is defined as "synonymous with fortification and refers to the addition of micronutrients to a food which are lost during processing". Read more...
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Selected images
A pizza factory in Germany, an example of food engineering
Machinery at a food science laboratory
Food scientists working in Australia
A technician performing quality control
Food packaging in progress
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