Food chemistry is the study of chemical processes and interactions of all biological and non-biological components of foods^[1][2]. The biological substances include such items as meat, poultry, lettuce, beer, and milk as examples. It is similar to biochemistry in its main components such as carbohydrates, lipids, and protein, but it also includes areas such as water, vitamins, minerals, enzymes, food additives, flavors, and colors. This discipline also encompasses how products change under certain food processing techniques and ways either to enhance or to prevent them from happening. An example of enhancing a process would be to encourage fermentation of dairy products with microorganisms that convert lactose to lactic acid; an example of preventing a process would be stopping the browning on the surface of freshly cut Red Delicious apples using lemon juice or other acidulated water.

History of food chemistry[link]

Food chemistry's history dates back as far as the late 18th century when many famous chemists were involved in discovering chemicals important in foods, including Carl Wilhelm Scheele (isolated malic acid from apples in 1785), and Sir Humphry Davy published the first book on agricultural and food chemistry in 1813 titled Elements of Agricultural Chemistry, in a Course of Lectures for the Board of Agriculture in the United Kingdom which would serve as a foundation for the profession worldwide, going into a fifth edition.

In 1874 the Society of Public Analysts was formed, with the aim of applying analytical methods to the benefit of the public.^[3] Its early experiments were based on bread, milk and wine.

It was also out of concern for the quality of the food supply, mainly food adulteration and contamination issues that would first stem from intentional contamination to later with chemical food additives by the 1950s. The development of colleges and universities worldwide, most notably in the United States, would expand food chemistry as well with research of the dietary substances, most notably the Single-grain experiment during 1907-11. Additional research by Harvey W. Wiley at the United States Department of Agriculture during the late 19th century would play a key factor in the creation of the United States Food and Drug Administration in 1906. The American Chemical Society would establish their Agricultural and Food Chemistry Division in 1908 while the Institute of Food Technologists would establish their Food Chemistry Division in 1995.

Food chemistry concepts are often drawn from rheology,theories of transport phenomena, physical and chemical thermodynamics, chemical bonds and interaction forces, quantum mechanics and reaction kinetics, biopolymer science, colloidal interactions, nucleation, glass transitions and freezing/disordered or noncrystalline solids, and thus has Food Physical Chemistry as a foundation area^[4][5].

Water in food systems[link]

A major component of food is water, which can encompass anywhere from 50% in meat products to 95% in lettuce, cabbage, and tomato products. It is also an excellent place for bacterial growth and food spoilage if it is not properly processed. One way this is measured in food is by water activity which is very important in the shelf life of many foods during processing. One of the keys to food preservation in most instances is reduce the amount of water or alter the water's characteristics to enhance shelf-life. Such methods include dehydration, freezing, and refrigeration^[6][7][8][9] This field encompasses the "physiochemical principles of the reactions and conversions that occur during the manufacture, handling, and storage of foods"^[10] .

Carbohydrates[link]

Sucrose: ordinary table sugar and probably the most familiar carbohydrate.

Comprising 75% of the biological world and 80% of all food intake for human consumption, the most common known human carbohydrate is starch. The simplest version of a carbohydrate is a monosaccharide which possesses the properties of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen in a 1:2:1 ratio under a general formula of C_nH_2nO_n where n is a minimum of 3. Glucose is an example of a monosaccharide as is fructose. Combine them in the picture shown to the right and you have sucrose, one of the more common sugar products around.

A chain of monosaccharides form to make a polysaccharide. Such polysaccharides include pectin, dextran, agar, and xanthan.

Sugar content is commonly measured in degrees brix.

Lipids[link]

The term lipid comprises a diverse range of molecules and to some exfor relatively water-insoluble or nonpolar compounds of biological origin, including waxes, fatty acids (including essential fatty acids), fatty-acid derived phospholipids, sphingolipids, glycolipids and terpenoids, such as retinoids and steroids. Some lipids are linear aliphatic molecules, while others have ring structures. Some are aromatic, while others are not. Some are flexible, while others are rigid.

Most lipids have some polar character in addition to being largely nonpolar. Generally, the bulk of their structure is nonpolar or hydrophobic ("water-fearing"), meaning that it does not interact well with polar solvents like water. Another part of their structure is polar or hydrophilic ("water-loving") and will tend to associate with polar solvents like water. This makes them amphiphilic molecules (having both hydrophobic and hydrophilic portions). In the case of cholesterol, the polar group is a mere -OH (hydroxyl or alcohol).

Lipids in food include the oils of such grains as corn, soybean, from animal fats, and are parts of many foods such as milk, cheese, and meat. They also act as vitamin carriers as well.

Food proteins[link]

Proteins compose over 50% of the dry weight of an average living cell and are very complex macromolecules. They also play a fundamental role in the structure and function of cells. Consisting mainly of carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, and some sulfur, they also may contain iron, copper, phosphorus, or zinc.

In food, proteins are essential for growth and survival and vary depending upon a person's age and physiology (e.g., pregnancy). Proteins in food are commonly found in peanuts, meat, poultry, and seafood. They are also involved in ELISA test for food allergy determination.

Enzymes[link]

Enzymes are biochemical catalysts used in converting processes from one substance to another. They are also involved in reducing the amount of time and energy required to complete a chemical process. Many aspects of the food industry use catalysts, including baking, brewing, dairy, and fruit juices, to make cheese, beer, and bread.

Vitamins[link]

Riboflavin (Vitamin B₂), water soluble

Vitamins are nutrients required in small amounts for essential metabolic reactions in the body. These are broken down in nutrition as either water soluble (Vitamin C) or fat soluble (Vitamin E). An adequate supply of vitamins can prevent diseases such as beriberi, anemia, and scurvy while an overdose of vitamins can produce nausea and vomiting or even death.

Minerals[link]

Dietary minerals in foods are large and diverse with many required to function while other trace elements can be hazardous if consumed in excessive amounts. Bulk minerals with a Reference Daily Intake (RDI, formerly Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA)) of more than 200 mg/day are calcium, magnesium, and potassium while important trace minerals (RDI less than 200 mg/day) are copper, iron, and zinc. These are found in many foods, but can also be taken in dietary supplements.

Color[link]

Food coloring is added to change the color of any food substance. It is mainly for sensory analysis purposes. It can be used to simulate the natural color of a product as perceived by the customer, such as red dye like FD&C Red No.40 (Allura Red AC) to ketchup or to add unnatural colors to a product like Kellogg's Froot Loops. Caramel is a natural food dye; the industrial form, caramel coloring, is the most widely-used food coloring and is found in foods from soft drinks to soy sauce, bread, and pickles.

Flavors[link]

Flavor in food is important in how food smells and tastes to the consumer, especially in sensory analysis. Some of these products occur naturally like salt and sugar, but flavor chemists (called a "flavorist") develop many of these flavors for food products. Such artificial flavors include methyl salicylate which creates the wintergreen odor and lactic acid which gives milk a tart taste.

Food additives[link]

Food additives are substances added to food for preserving flavors, or improving taste or appearance. These processes are as old as adding vinegar for pickling or as an emulsifier for emulsion mixtures like mayonnaise. These are generally listed by "E number" in the European Union or GRAS ("generally recognized as safe") by the United States Food and Drug Administration.

See also[link]

	Food portal
	Chemistry portal
	Physics portal

• Food physical chemistry
• Dietary supplement
• Food and Bioprocess Technology (journal)
• Food Chemistry (journal)
• Food engineering
• Food fortification
• Food microbiology
• Food packaging
• Food preservation
• Food rheology
• Food safety
• Food science
• Food storage
• Food supplements
• Food technology
• Nutraceutical
• Nutrification (also called food enrichment or fortification)

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Fennema, O.R., Ed. (1985). Food Chemistry - Second Edition, Revised and Expanded. New York: Marcel Dekker, Inc.
• Francis, F.J. (2000). "Harvey W. Wiley: Pioneer in Food Science and Quality." In A Century of Food Science. Chicago: Institute of Food Technologists. pp. 13–14.
• Potter, N.N. and J.H. Hotchkiss. (1995). Food Science, Fifth Edition. New York: Champman & Hall. pp. 24–68.
• U.S. Food and Drug Administration. (1993). Everything Added to Food in the United States. Boca Raton, FL: C.K. Smoley (c/o CRC press, Inc.).

External links[link]

• American Chemical Society Agricultural and Food Chemistry Division website.
• Institute of Food Technologists Food Chemistry Division website.
• Association of Public Analysts
• The Penn State University,Food Chemistry,USA
• Wageningen University, Laboratory of Food Chemistry, The Netherlands

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Hervé This
The chemist Hervé This
Born	1955 Suresnes, Hauts-de-Seine
Nationality	French
Fields	Chemistry
Institutions	Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique
Known for	Molecular gastronomy

Hervé This (pronounced: [tis]; born 1955 in Suresnes, Hauts-de-Seine) is a French physical chemist who works for the Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique at AgroParisTech, in Paris (France). His main area of scientific research is molecular gastronomy, that is the science of culinary phenomena (more precisely, looking for the mechanisms of phenomena occurring during culinary transformations).

With the late Nicholas Kurti, he coined the scientific term "Molecular and Physical Gastronomy" in 1988, which he shortened to "Molecular Gastronomy" after Kurti's death in 1998.^[1] Graduated from École supérieure de physique et de chimie industrielles de la ville de Paris,^[2] he obtained a Ph.D from the University Paris VI, under the title "La gastronomie moléculaire et physique".^[3] He has written many scientific publications,^[4] as well as several books on the subject which can be understood even by those who have little or no knowledge of chemistry, but so far only four have been translated into English. He also collaborates with the magazine Pour la Science, the aim of which is to present scientific concepts to the general public. He is also a corresponding member of the Académie d'agriculture de France, and, more recently, the scientific director of the foundation "Food Science & Culture", which he created at the French Academy of Science. In 2011, he was elected as a Consulting Professor of AgroParisTech, and he was also asked to create courses on science and technology at Sciences Po Paris.

Some of his discoveries include the perfect temperature for cooking an egg (around 65°C, the white coagulates, but not the yolk), and the use of an electrical field to improve the smoking of salmon. He also found that beating an egg white after adding a small amount of cold water considerably increases the amount of foam produced. Every month he adds one new "invention" in the Art et Science section of the website of the chef Pierre Gagnaire.^[5]

Although his main focus is on physical chemistry, he also attributes great importance to the emotional aspect of cooking, as the title of one of his books shows: Cooking is love, art, technique.

The latest work by Hervé This, in conjunction with Pierre Gagnaire, has been the formation and promotion of 'note by note' cuisine - the next stage in the appliance of science to the kitchen after molecular gastronomy. Note by note cooking involves taking the molecules that compose ingredients used in cooking, and using these as the raw ingredients for a dish. “If you use pure compounds, you open up billions and billions of new possibilities,” Mr This said. “It's like a painter using primary colours or a musician composing note by note.” ^[6]

As part of the 2011 International Year of Chemistry, The French Embassy in Ireland in association with the Institut Français, the Alliance Française Dublin, the Lycée Français d’Irlande and the French Trade Commission UBIFRANCE put on a number of lectures around Dublin, Ireland where Hervé This performed demonstrations and promoted the new concept of 'note by note' cuisine.^[7]

Hervé This at Dublin Institute of Technology, Cathal Brugha Street, 2011 with student Ciarán Elliott demonstrating how to achieve a greater volume when whipping egg whites.

Bibliography[link]

• 1993 : les Secrets de la casserole, Éditions Belin
• 1995 : Révélations gastronomiques, Éditions Belin. ISBN 2-7011-1756-9
• 1997 : la Casserole des enfants, Éditions Belin
• 2002 : Traité élémentaire de cuisine, Éditions Belin
• 2002 : Casseroles et éprouvettes, Éditions Belin
• 2005 : Molecular Gastronomy: Exploring the Science of Flavor (translator: Malcolm DeBevoise), Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-231-13312-X
• 2006 : La cuisine c'est de l'amour, de l'art, de la technique, Odile Jacob
• 2007 : Construisons un repas, Odile Jacob
• 2007 : De la science aux fourneaux, Pour la Science/Editions Belin
• 2007 : Kitchen Mysteries: Revealing the Science of Cooking (translator: Jody Glading), Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-14170-3 or 023114170X
• 2007 : Alchimistes aux fourneaux, Flammarion
• 2009 : "Building a Meal: From Molecular Gastronomy to Culinary Constructivism (Arts and Traditions of the Table: Perspectives on Culinary History)" (translator: Malcolm DeBevoise), Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-14466-7
• 2009 : Cours de gastronomie moléculaire n°1 : Science, technologie, technique (culinaires) : quelles relations?, Quae/Belin, Paris.
• 2011 : Cours de gastronomie moléculaire n°2 : Les Précisions culinaires, Quae/Belin, Paris.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Hervé This blog(French)
• La gastronomie moléculaire Hervé This page at INRA (French)
• Fondation Science & Culture Alimentaire (French)
• Cours de gastronomie moléculaire (French)
• Molecular Gastronomy Seminar with Hervé This

Bill Nye
Nye at Bridgewater State University in 2007
Born	(1955-11-27) November 27, 1955 (age 56)[1] Washington, D.C.[1]
Residence	Los Angeles
Fields	Mechanical engineering
Institutions	Boeing Cornell University Planetary Society
Alma mater	Cornell University (BS)
Known for	Bill Nye the Science Guy
Signature

William Sanford "Bill" Nye (born November 27, 1955),^[2] popularly known as Bill Nye the Science Guy, is an American science educator, comedian, television host, actor, mechanical engineer, and scientist. He is best known as the host of the Disney/PBS children's science show Bill Nye the Science Guy (1993–1998) and for his many subsequent appearances in popular media as a science educator.

Early life and career[link]

William Sanford Nye was born in Washington, D.C., the son of Jacqueline (née Jenkins; c. 1920–2000), a codebreaker during World War II, and Edwin Darby "Ned" Nye (died 1997), also a World War II veteran whose experience in a Japanese prisoner of war camp led him to become a sundial enthusiast.^[3][4][5] Nye is a fourth-generation Washington, D.C. resident on his father's side of the family. After attending Lafayette Elementary and Alice Deal Junior High in the city, he was accepted to the private Sidwell Friends School on a partial scholarship, graduating in 1973.^[6][7] He studied mechanical engineering at Cornell University, where one of his professors was Carl Sagan,^[8] and graduated with a Bachelor of Science in 1977.^[9] He was awarded an honorary doctorate by The Johns Hopkins University in May 2008. In May 2011, Nye was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Science degree from Willamette University where he was the keynote speaker for that year's commencement exercises.^[10]

Nye began his career in Seattle at Boeing, where, among other things, he starred in training films and developed a hydraulic pressure resonance suppressor still used in the 747. Later he worked as a consultant in the aeronautics industry. Nye told the St. Petersburg Times in 1999 that he applied to be a NASA astronaut every few years but was always rejected.^[11]

The Science Guy[link]

Nye began his professional entertainment career as an actor on a local sketch comedy television show in Seattle, Almost Live!; Nye attempted to correct the host of Almost Live! after the host pronounced "gigawatt" as "jigowatt."^[12][13] The character name came from the host's comment "Who do you think you are—Bill Nye the Science Guy?" and Nye was thereafter known as such on the program. His other main recurring role on Almost Live! was as Speedwalker, a speedwalking Seattle superhero.

Coincidentally, in 1991–93 he appeared in the live-action educational segments of Back to the Future: The Animated Series with a nonspeaking role as an assistant to Dr. Emmett Brown, played by Christopher Lloyd, in which he would demonstrate science with Lloyd's voice-over. The segments' national popularity led to Nye's hosting the educational television program Bill Nye the Science Guy from 1993 to 1998. Each of the 100 episodes aimed to teach a specific topic in science to a preteen audience, yet it garnered a wide adult audience as well. The show was very popular as a school resource and is still used to this day. He has written several books as The Science Guy. In addition to hosting the show, he was also a writer and producer for the series, which was filmed entirely in Seattle.

When portraying "the Science Guy", Nye wears a light blue lab coat and a bow tie and takes on the persona of an excited, jocular science educator. This popular image of Nye has been parodied by numerous sources, including the webcomic xkcd^[14] and the satirical news organization The Onion.^[15][16] In response to the fake headline "Crack Nearly Killed Me," Nye took the joke in good humor and sent The Onion an email thanking them for "dealing compassionately with this matter."^[17]

He appeared in his Science Guy persona alongside Ellen DeGeneres and Alex Trebek in Ellen's Energy Adventure, an attraction that has played since 1996 at the Universe of Energy pavilion inside Epcot at Walt Disney World. He also has a voice-over at the DINOSAUR attraction in Disney's Animal Kingdom park, where he tells guests about the dinosaurs while they queue for the ride. In addition, he appears in the "Design Lab" of CyberSpace Mountain inside DisneyQuest at Walt Disney World, where he refers to himself as "Bill Nye the Coaster Guy."

[edit] Post-Science Guy career

This article is in a list format that may be better presented using prose. You can help by converting this article to prose, if appropriate. Editing help is available. (May 2010)

Bill Nye "The Science Guy" and Executive Director of The Planetary Society received the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry's "In Praise of Reason" Award at CSICON 2011 in New Orleans

Nye remained interested in science education through entertainment. He created a 13-episode PBS KCTS-TV series about science, called The Eyes of Nye, aimed at an older audience than his previous show had been. Airing in 2005, it often featured episodes based on politically relevant themes such as genetically modified food, global warming, and race.

He played a science teacher in Disney's 1998 TV movie The Principal Takes a Holiday; he made a hovercraft in order to demonstrate science in an unusual classroom manner. From 2000 to 2002, Nye was the technical expert in BattleBots. In 2004 and 2005, Nye hosted 100 Greatest Discoveries, an award-winning series produced by THINKFilm for The Science Channel and in high definition on the Discovery HD Theater. He was also host of an eight-part Discovery Channel series called Greatest Inventions with Bill Nye.

Nye has guest-starred in several episodes of the crime drama Numb3rs as an engineering faculty member. A lecture Nye gave several years ago on exciting children about math was an inspiration for creating the Numb3rs show.^[18]

Bill joined the American Optometric Association in a multimedia advertising campaign to educate parents on the importance of getting their children a comprehensive eye examination.^[19]

He was a regular in TV Land discussions. He has also made guest appearances on the VH1 reality show America's Most Smartest Model.^[20]

Nye appears in segments of The Climate Code on The Weather Channel, telling his personal ways of saving energy. He still makes regular appearances on the show, often asking quiz questions.

As of fall 2008, Nye also appears on the daytime game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire as part of the show's reintroduced "Ask the Expert" lifeline. In 2008, he also hosted Stuff Happens, a show on the then new Planet Green network.

In November 2008, Nye appeared in an acting role as himself in the fifth-season episode "Brain Storm" of Stargate Atlantis alongside fellow television personality and astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.^[21]

Nye has appeared numerous times on the talk show Larry King Live, speaking about topics such as global warming^[22] and UFOs.^[23] He argued that global warming is an issue that should be addressed by governments of the world in part because it could be implicated in the record-setting 2005 Atlantic hurricane season. On UFOs he has been skeptical of extraterrestrial explanations for sightings such as those at Roswell and Malmstrom Air Force Base in 1967.

In 2009, portions of Bill Nye's shows were used as lyrics and portions of the second Symphony of Science science education music video by composer John Boswell.

Nye recorded a short YouTube video (as himself, not his TV persona) advocating clean energy climate change legislation on behalf of Al Gore's Repower America campaign in October 2009.^[24]

Nye (as his TV persona) also made a guest appearance on The Dr. Oz Show.

On March 12, 2011, Nye made an appearance on CNN to discuss the evolving nuclear incidents in Japan as a result of the devastating earthquake and tsunami there. Nye erroneously stated that cesium is used to "slow and control" the nuclear reaction. ^[25] In reality, cesium (specifically cesium-137) is a nuclear fission product, not a control rod material. Nye also erroneously stated that the nuclear reactor involved in the Three Mile Island incident is still running and that the use of boron to slow the nuclear chain reaction is uncommon, when in fact boron-10 is commonly used in control rods, and is circulated in the coolant of reactors in the United States, as well as stored on site as a method of emergency shutdown.^[26][27]

A solar noon clock atop Rhodes Hall was gifted from Nye to Cornell on Aug. 27 following a public lecture that filled the 715-seat Statler Auditorium. Nye talked about his father's passion for sundials and timekeeping, his time at Cornell, his work on the sundials mounted on the Mars rovers and the story behind the Bill Nye Solar Noon Clock. ^[28]

Life outside television[link]

Nye speaking in 2010.

In the early 2000s, Nye assisted in the development of a small sundial that was included in the Mars Exploration Rover missions. Known as MarsDial, it included small colored panels to provide a basis for color calibration in addition to helping keep track of time.^[29] From 2005 to 2010 Nye was the vice president of The Planetary Society, an organization that advocates space science research and the exploration of other planets, particularly Mars.^[30] He became the organization's second Executive Director in September 2010 when Louis Friedman stepped down.^[31][32]

In November 2010, Nye became the face of a new permanent exhibition at the Chabot Space & Science Center in Oakland, CA. Bill Nye’s Climate Lab features Nye as commander of the Clean Energy Space Station, and invites visitors on an urgent mission to thwart climate change. Beginning with a view of Planet Earth from space, visitors explore air, water, and land galleries to discover how climate change affects Earth’s connected systems, and how to use the Sun, wind, land, and water to generate clean energy. In an interview about the exhibit, Nye said, “Everything in the exhibit is geared to showing you that the size of the problem of climate change is big. Showing you a lot about energy use... It’s a huge opportunity... We need young people, entrepreneurs, young inventors, young innovators to change the world.” ^[33]

He holds several United States patents,^[34] including one for ballet pointe shoes^[30] and another for an educational magnifying glass created by filling a clear plastic bag with water.^[35][36] From 2001–2006 Nye served as Frank H.T. Rhodes Class of '56 University Professor at Cornell University.^[9][37] Nye supported the 2006 reclassification of Pluto from a planet to a dwarf planet by the International Astronomical Union.^[38]

Since 2006, Nye has lived in Los Angeles in a house with modifications, though has owned a house on Mercer Island.^{[citation needed]} As of July 2007, Nye and environmental activist Ed Begley, Jr. are engaging in a friendly competition "to see who could have the lowest carbon footprint," according to Begley.^[39] In a 2008 interview, Nye joked that he wants to "crush Ed Begley" in their environmental competition.^[40] Nye and Begley are neighbors in Los Angeles, and sometimes dine together at a local vegetarian restaurant.^[40] Nye often appears on Begley's Planet Green reality show Living with Ed.

Nye made an appearance in Palmdale's 2010 video "Here Comes the Summer"^[41]; the band's lead singer Kay Hanley is his neighbor.

Nye is a fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, a U.S. non-profit scientific and educational organization whose aim is to promote scientific inquiry, critical investigation, and the use of reason in examining controversial and extraordinary claims.^[42]

Interviewed by John Rael for the Independent Investigation Group IIG, Nye stated that his "concern right now... scientific illiteracy... you don't [the public] have enough rudimentary knowledge of the universe to evaluate claims."^[43]

Personal life[link]

Nye announced his engagement during an appearance on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson and was married briefly to his fiancée of five months, author Blair Tindall, on February 3, 2006. The ceremony was performed by Rick Warren at The Entertainment Gathering at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles. Yo-Yo Ma provided the music.^[44] Nye left the relationship seven weeks later when the marriage license was declared invalid;^[45] their impromptu ceremony, which preceded the license purchase, violated California state law, said Tindall in a radio interview.^[46] Nye later secured a temporary restraining order against Tindall after she entered his property late at night to pour weed killer in his garden.^[45]

Nye enjoys baseball and occasionally does experiments involving the physics of the game. As a longtime Seattle resident before becoming an entertainer, he is said to have been a fan of the Seattle Mariners, although recently he has voiced his preference (as a D.C. native) for the Washington Nationals.^[6]

References[link]