Study questions sucralose stability in bakery

By Stephen Daniells, 26-Jan-2010

Related topics: Science & Nutrition, Food safety and labeling, Sweeteners (intense, bulk, polyols)

Bakery formulators who use ingredients like glycerol or fats should exercise caution when using sucralose, suggests a new study from Canada.

IFF targets Russian tastes with new Moscow facility

By Jess Halliday, 03-Dec-2009

Related topics: Financial & Industry

International Flavors and Fragrances cut the ribbon on a new facility in Moscow, which will help it get closer to its customers and understand tastes in the high-potential Russian market.

Gouda’s 800-year-old secret could benefit flavour for all dairy

By Stephen Daniells, 06-Mar-2009

Related topics: Products, Ingredients and additives

German scientists have reportedly cracked the secret of Gouda’s complex, long-lasting flavour, and this could lead to developing more flavourful cheeses and other dairy products.

Writing in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, German scientists report that six gamma-glutamyl peptides that appear to be mainly responsible for the so-called ‘kokumi sensation’ behind Gouda.

“As these gamma-glutamyl peptides might have important implications also to the taste profile of other dairy products, studies on the biogeneration of these kokumi peptides during cheese ripening are currently in progress,” wrote the researchers, led by Thomas Hofmann from the Technical University of Munich.

Gouda was first perfected by farmers in the village of Gouda in Holland about 800 years ago. According to background information in the journal, although many studies over the last three decades have attempted to elucidate the compounds responsible for the complex, long-lasting characteristic taste of the popular cheese, known as the “kokumi sensation”, the answers have eluded researchers until now.

TU Munich’s Hofmann and Andreas Dunkel, in collaboration with Simone Toelstede from the University of Münster, used molecular sensory science to show that a 44-week-matured Gouda cheese had a more pronounced ‘mouthfulness’ and long-lasting taste complexity than a four week old Gouda.

Further analysis using a combination of high performance liquid chromatography, mass spectroscopy, and gel permeation chromatography (GPC) enabled the identification of two classes of protein, 8 alpha-l-glutamyl and 10 gamma-l-glutamyl dipeptides as potential kokumi-enhancing molecules.

However, only the gamma-l-glutamyl dipeptides were found to “impart an enhanced kokumi sensation to the matured cheese, whereas none of the alpha-glutamyl peptides were found to be active”, said the researchers.

Among these peptides, the key kokumi molecules were proposed to be gamma-Glu-Glu, gamma-Glu-Gly, gamma-Glu-Gln, gamma-Glu-Met, gamma-Glu-Leu, and gamma-Glu-His.

This knowledge could be used to enhance the flavour of dairy products by technological means, said the researchers.

Source: Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry
2009, Volume 57, Issue 4, Pages 1440-1448, doi: 10.1021/jf803376d
“A Series of Kokumi Peptides Impart the Long-Lasting Mouthfulness of Matured Gouda Cheese”
Authors: S. Toelstede, A. Dunkel, T. Hofmann

 toolbar.

ASTRONOMERS searching for the building blocks of life in a giant dust cloud at the heart of the Milky Way have concluded that they taste vaguely of raspberries.

The discovery follows years of work by astronomers who trained their 30-metre Spanish radio telescope on the enormous ball of dust and gas in the hope of spotting complex molecules that are vital for life.

Finding amino acids in interstellar space is a holy grail for astrobiologists, as this would raise the possibility of life emerging on other planets after being seeded with the molecules.

In the latest survey, astronomers sifted through thousands of signals from Sagittarius B2, a vast dust cloud at the centre of our galaxy. While they failed to find evidence for amino acids, they did find a substance called ethyl formate, the chemical responsible for the flavour of raspberries. "It does happen to give raspberries their flavour, but there are many other molecules that are needed to make space raspberries," Dr Arnaud Belloche, an astronomer at the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Bonn, said.

Ethyl formate has another distinguishing characteristic: it also smells of rum.

While scouring their data, the team found evidence for the lethal chemical propyl cyanide in the same cloud. The two molecules are the largest yet discovered in deep space.

Dr Belloche and his colleague, Robin Garrod at Cornell University in New York, have collected about 4000 distinct signals from the cloud. "So far we have identified around 50 molecules in our survey, and two of those had not been seen before," said Dr Belloche.

The results were presented yesterday at the European week of astronomy and space science at the University of Hertfordshire. Last year, the team came tantalisingly close to finding amino acids in space with the discovery of a molecule that can be used to make them, called amino acetonitrile.

The latest discoveries have boosted the researchers' morale because the molecules are as large as the simplest amino acid, glycine. Amino acids are the building blocks of proteins and critical for complex life to exist anywhere in the universe. "I wouldn't be surprised if we find an amino acid out there in the coming years," Dr Belloche said.

European astronomers also announced the discovery of the lightest planet yet found circling another star.

Michel Mayor, of Switzerland's Geneva Observatory, said the planet, named Gliese 581 e, has a mass just 1.9 times that of Earth.

Although probably rocky, like Earth, there is little chance of it being inhabited as it is so close to its parent star that its year lasts just 3.15 days. The planet is one of four known to circle the star, 20.5 light years from Earth.

The astronomers also confirmed that the star's fourth planet, Gliese 581 d, orbits in the "habitable zone", where it is neither too hot or too cold for water, and thus "could even be covered by a large and deep ocean".

Guardian News & Media 2009

Success Smells Like Vanilla as Flavors Buck Slump (Update2)

By Andrew Noel and Antonio Ligi

March 19 (Bloomberg) -- The smell of success in this recession is Madagascan vanilla.

As cash-strapped consumers trade down to cheaper products, flavor developers such as Symrise AG say orders are rising for exotic vanillas and Brazilian citrus. Some large clients of Symrise, which supplies yogurt maker Groupe Danone SA and Christian Dior SA, are asking for aromas to make low-cost shampoo alluring as buyers switch from luxury items, Chief Executive Officer Gerold Linzbach said.

“The crisis has given people a more sober attitude toward expensive things,” Linzbach said in an interview. “The whole luxury segment has a big question mark next to it. We are concentrating on price-value levels which are sensible.”

The $21 billion flavors and fragrance market is bucking the deterioration in the wider chemical industry because consumers still need food and personal-care products. In the U.S. alone, sales will rise 3.7 percent annually to $5.3 billion in 2012, according to Ohio-based research group Freedonia.

That’s got aroma and taste creators sending perfumers and scientists to rural India to capture new scents and pick ingredients to make potato chips taste like curry.

Givaudan SA, based in Vernier, Switzerland, is the world’s largest supplier, followed by privately held Firmenich of Geneva and International Flavors & Fragrances Inc. of New York. Holzminden, Germany-based Symrise is the fourth largest.

Recession Cuisine

Additives and ingredients for consumer items will be the bright spot of the $2 trillion chemical industry, with output forecast to remain flat this year, according to the European Chemical Industry Council. Overall chemical production will fall 1.3 percent in Europe and 2 percent in the U.S., led by shrinking polymers output. Falling orders for cement additives and plastics cut profit at BASF SE, which on Feb. 26 predicted lower 2009 sales. BASF is the world’s largest chemical company.

Demand for natural ingredients is an established trend, as is the need for flavors and fragrances to counter the unpleasant aromas and tastes of vitamins, minerals, bleaches and antioxidants, Freedonia said in a January report.

With the onset of recession, consumers are moving away from high-end luxury perfumes, creating an opportunity to sell high- impact, yet lower-cost products more in tune with today’s wilted consumer budgets, Symrise said. That’s in keeping with food- retailing trends, with Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Aldi Group of Germany benefiting from greater demand for discounted items.

“The food and flavors arena is more defensive and resistant to recession,” Frutarom Industries Ltd. CEO Ori Yehudai said in an interview.

Peach, Musk, Melon

Frutarom, which produces flavors ranging from peach and melon to the Amazonian fruit asai and musk, spends about 7 to 8 percent of its annual sales on research and development. Revenue rose 29 percent last year to $473 million, it reported today. Part of this year’s budget is being channeled into developing cheaper products that offer the same taste and smell sensations as costlier alternatives. Frutarom expects to outpace the market and grow this year, Yehudai said.

“Even if the consumer is moving from a branded Unilever or Procter & Gamble product into a private label, these guys are still the suppliers,” said Jon Cox, an analyst at Kepler Capital Markets, with “buy” rating on Givaudan. “It adds another level of defense.”

About 90 percent of Symrise’s 1.32 billion euros ($1.8 billion) in annual revenue is generated from “basic needs” items such as shower gel and cleaning agents. Best sellers in 2009 will be Madagascan vanilla and citrus, the company said.

‘Cool’ Products

Madagascar produces more than half of the world’s vanilla and the ousting of former President Marc Ravalomanana yesterday hasn’t altered the outlook for supplies, said Michel Manceau, head of Eguilles, France-based consultant Demeter SA and an adviser to the European Union on vanilla.

There is also demand for “cool” products that offer the element of surprise, Symrise’s Linzbach said. The company last year sent a team of seven perfumers to explore markets and the countryside in India. This year, the destination is China.

Symrise installed new equipment to develop slow-release aromas at its Singapore laboratory at the end of 2008 and Linzbach plans to add the same technology to a U.S. complex.

In vogue for 2009 will be exotic fruits, including persimmon and starfruit, according to London-based market researcher Mintel. Fresh, soothing aromas with a touch of spice will become popular in many home and personal products, it said. For flavorings, chicken tikka masala, based on one of the most popular Indian curry dishes in the U.K., could win over consumers across the globe.

“By adding exotic fruits and more unusual ingredients to everyday products, companies give people the opportunity to experiment and move out of their comfort zones without breaking the bank,” said Mintel’s David Jago in an e-mailed statement.

For Related News and Information: News on Symrise SY1 GY <Equity> CN <GO> News on chemicals: NSE CHEMICALS <GO> BASF earnings: BAS GY <Equity> EM <GO>

Lecithin additive may find health niche

By Stephen Daniells, 31-Jul-2009

Related topics: Science & Nutrition

A component of the common food additive lecithin my help the liver process fat and glucose, opening up lecithin to a potential role in the growing health ingredients category.

By: Tim McKeoughWed Mar 18, 2009 at 1:00 PM

If you notice sometime in the not-too-distant future that those chicken fingers you ordered taste different, well, you might be onto something. International Flavors & Fragrances and Givaudan, two of the world's largest flavor companies, have separately embarked on major research projects in pursuit of "more authentic" chicken flavors. "We thought we already had them," says Jos Muilwijk, IFF's head of global savory category management. "But when we started to screen those flavors against true culinary benchmarks, we saw that there was still a significant gap."

IFF flavorists decided they needed a new standard to replicate, so they dispatched the company's master chef, Florian Webhofer, to source the widest variety of raw chicken he could find and to prepare it in countless ways. In a series of blind tastings, the team picked "gold standard" dishes, simply cooked using methods such as boiling and sous vide. Lab technicians then copied those flavors to build a new chicken "tool kit" with five core flavors -- boiled white meat, boiled dark meat, skin, roasted, and grilled -- which can be blended to flavor everything from packaged soup to instant noodles to chicken burgers.

At Givaudan, researchers visited 14 countries to observe cultural differences in chicken prep in homes and restaurants. "A chicken profile for South America must be different from a chicken profile for North America," says Michael Peters, head of global flavor-creation technology. After creating a family of chicken flavors, Givaudan used its Virtual Aroma Synthesizer -- a device that sprays scented air at subjects -- to test those flavors. "When it comes to flavor, the difference is all in the aroma," explains Peters. While taste buds are normally overwhelmed after three or four dishes, the synthesizer allows subjects to test dozens of aromas in one sitting.

These industrial approaches to flavor development may be disconcerting, but they're also responsible for the taste of thousands of products on supermarket shelves. Artificial flavors can often mean lower prices. But "eating foods in their more natural state is a lot more healthful for the variety of nutrients they provide," says Christine Gerbstadt of the American Dietetic Association. In other words, if you want authentic chicken flavor, you could just eat chicken.

Aroma, taste and texture drive refreshing perception: Study

By Stephen Daniells, 14-Jan-2009

Related topics: Science & Nutrition

A consumer’s perception of a refreshing sensation in food is driven by the cold/mint flavour, the acidity of the formulation, and the thickness of the product, according to research from Nestle.

What's that smell? ... computer scientists have been using Half Life 2 (pictured) to develop smell technology / Valve

• Smell effects headed for games
• Technology developed by military
• Technology: More video game news

VIDEO games could one day be fitted with realistic smell effects as technology developed to help train the military makes its way to home consoles.

The effects will allow players to experience the odours of the virtual world they are playing their games in, such as a racetrack or the battlefield.

Computer scientists are superimposing new technology that simulates senses such as smell and sound, while using the kits of games such as Far Cry and Half Life to simulate the tricky movements and physics of the virtual world.

One such scientist, Professor Bob Stone of Birmingham University, has adapted a scent delivery system to make the training games more realistic.

The system consists of eight chambers, each of which holds a pot of wax impregnated with a pungent odour, ranging from gingerbread to a mix of odours designed to evoke combat.

On command from the computer, air is blown over several of the chambers to stir up an instant impression of Kandahar in war-torn Afghanistan.

Related Coverage

• Reader's Comments: Future video games could really stinkNEWS.com.au,
• Terrorists arriving? Only the nose knowsThe Australian, 30 Mar 2009
• Something's blowing in the windDaily Telegraph, 19 Mar 2009
• Smell and tellThe Australian, 7 Feb 2009
• Weird and wonderful science of 2008Perth Now, 19 Dec 2008

Your Say

Haha, just what we need. Nerds computer rooms the world over will stink even more so.

(Read More)

Dan of Perth

"Smell is the most underrated sense, but next to vision it is the most information-rich one we have," Professor Stone said.

He is in the process of writing code into his games that will cause the machine to release smells at appropriate times.

In a battle scenario the system releases the odour of cordite, a pungent residue of gunfire.

Article date
Click to enter the date and a brief description of this news article or press release. You may want to include an excerpt from the article or a sentence or two about the publication in which the story appeared. To link the article title to another web site or document, select the title and click the "Link" button in your editing toolbar.

By Jess Halliday, 23-Jul-2008

Related topics: Healthier products, Financial & Industry, Sweeteners (intense, bulk, polyols)

Fusion Nutraceuticals is reporting interest in its recently launched sucralose as a replacer for aspartame in food and beverage products, as manufacturers seek to meet retailer and consumer demand for aspartame-free products.

Erythritol’s antioxidant activity may add to diabetes benefits

By Stephen Daniells, 03-Sep-2009

Related topics: Healthier products, Science & Nutrition, Health and nutritional ingredients, Sweeteners (intense, bulk, polyols)

The zero-calorie sweetener erythritol may exert a strong antioxidant activity which may protect vascular health of diabetics, says a new study from The Netherlands.

Anti-hunger aromas have real potential in obesity fight

By Stephen Daniells, 17-Dec-2009

Related topics: Science & Nutrition

The concept of using aroma to produce anti-hunger feelings during chewing is “promising and appealing”, says a timely review of the science-to-date.

Taste receptor for carbonation discovered, claim scientists

By Caroline Scott-Thomas, 19-Oct-2009

Related topics: Science & Nutrition, Flavors and colors

Scientists claim to have discovered the taste receptor for carbonation, saying that it is perceived in a similar way to sour flavors – and provide an explanation for fizzy drinks’ tingling sensation.

The findings add to the fast-accumulating body of knowledge on how tastes are perceived, including salty, sweet, bitter, sour and umami (or savory) taste perception. But the authors of this latest research say that there is emerging evidence suggesting that people could be capable of distinguishing other flavors, such as fat or metallic tastes. Entitled "The Taste of Carbonation", the study has been published in the journal Science by researchers from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and their colleagues from the University of California, San Diego.

They describe an enzyme – carbonic anhydrase 4 – responsible for sensing the taste of carbonation, “tethered like a small flag from the surface of sour-sensing cells in taste buds”. They write that it is this enzyme that interacts with the carbon dioxide in the drink, activates the sour cells, and sends a signal to the brain.

Senior author of the study and scientist at the NIH’s National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research Nicholas Ryba said: “Of course, this raises the question of why carbonation doesn’t just taste sour.”

He explained that carbon dioxide also stimulates the mouth’s somatosensory system, which is responsible for sensations such as touch, temperature and pain. Therefore, the perception of carbonation reflects a combination of somatosensory information and taste information.

Rustling up Truffles

Most people who live in Italy for any period of time eventually become curious about truffles. It's not so much that Italian truffles, with their pungent smell and earthy flavor, are an acquired taste; they are simply hard to acquire, appearing on menus only at certain times of year and in certain regions. Unlike French black truffles, which are far more common, the Italian Precious Whites are a rare delicacy, worth as much as €4,000 a kilo, and surrounded by colorful folklore. Personally, I always imagined graying men with woven baskets and funny hats roaming the Tuscan countryside behind pigs, in pursuit of a mysterious fungus. A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough to go on a truffle hunt and found most of the myths shattered.

Truffle hunting has been part of the Italian lifestyle for generations, but it is only now becoming a popular niche travel adventure as Italians focus on reinventing ancient traditions. In the 16th century, when truffles were a staple among aristocrats, they were rooted out by pigs, which were often starved as motivation to find the valuable loot. Modern trufflers, or tartufai, use dogs because even the smartest pigs could not resist eating the booty. And today's hunters need to know much more than where to look; they must qualify for a license to dig up truffles. Only nine out of 20 truffle species can be harvested and sold in Italy, so hunters have to be able to identify the various types by their scientific genome. They also have to take an oath that includes promising minimal disturbance to the environment and using the traditional vanghetto digging tool. "It takes about 20 days to get the license," says Tuscan truffler Giacomo Bombardi. "But it takes about 20 years to become a true tartufai."

Like other forms of hunting, truffling involves as much patience as practice. Part of the fungus family, truffles are like mushrooms that grow underground. It is impossible to know exactly where they grow, but they are most often found in clay-heavy soil under oak, poplar, hazelnut, and willow trees. Truffles reveal themselves only by aroma, so hunters rely entirely on their dogs to sniff out the buried treasure. The whole experience is intensely thrilling, from the moment the dog starts barking wildly to the hunter's gentle tapping around the truffle to excavate it without puncturing or breaking it. When Bombardi's dog, Rosa, caught the scent near a riverbed outside Siena on a recent muddy Sunday morning, she yelped and started digging frantically until Bombardi playfully pushed her away. She was as excited as he was to see what was underground. Maybe, Bombardi teased, it will be as big as the 1.5 kilogram truffle found near here two years ago, which sold at auction for €220,600. "This might just be the tip of it," he said with a wink, tapping the tiny dark gray mass with his trowel. "Most people never get to see a truffle like this."

The truffle Rosa found was only about 8cm in diameter and weighed just a few grams. But Bombardi was right about one thing: most people never get to see a real truffle at all, let alone in situ. Instead, they end up with tiny shards on pasta or the mere essence infused into oil. Anything less than fresh is fake, goes the saying in Italy, and it is better to wait a whole year for the season to come again than to suffer through an inferior truffle. "An Italian white truffle has to be born here," explains Giselle Oberti, the producer of Italy's annual international white-truffle auction. "It represents the essence of the region where it formed."

In recent years, white truffles have become exceptionally scarce because of hotter, drier weather. Precious Whites are most common in the Alba region of Piedmont and throughout northern Tuscany. A more common version, considered inferior in taste and quality, is known as the Whitish or marzuolo truffle and is worth just €150 a kilo. The demand for the Precious Whites has created a black market for those who harvest them without a license and has inspired fraudsters to try to pass off the Whitish truffles as the real thing. "Fraud is an enormous problem in this industry," says Moreno Moroni, president of the local Tartufai Association near Siena. "It is like selling gold filament instead of the real thing."

During the hunt I was on, Bombardi, Moroni, and their dogs found six white truffles of varying shapes and sizes, and gave us each one as a souvenir. The gloves I was wearing that day still have a slight hint of the unique truffle aroma—rotting fungus intermingled with clean air and cypress trees—leaving an unforgettable memory that takes me immediately back to the hunt.

Dominant Chemical That Attracts Mosquitoes To Humans Identified

ScienceDaily (Oct. 26, 2009) — Scientists at the University of California, Davis, have identified the dominant odor naturally produced in humans and birds that attracts the blood-feeding Culex mosquitoes, which transmit West Nile virus and other life-threatening diseases.

The groundbreaking research, published this week in the early online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, explains why mosquitoes shifted hosts from birds to humans and paves the way for key developments in mosquito and disease control.

Entomology professor Walter Leal and postdoctoral researcher Zain Syed found that nonanal (sounds like NAWN-uh-nawl) is the powerful semiochemical that triggers the mosquitoes' keen sense of smell, directing them toward a blood meal. A semiochemical is a chemical substance or mixture that carries a message.

"Nonanal is how they find us," Leal said. "The antennae of the Culex quinquefasciatus are highly developed to detect even extremely low concentrations of nonanal." Mosquitoes detect smells with the olfactory receptor neurons of their antennae.

Birds, the main hosts of mosquitoes, serve as the reservoir for the West Nile virus, Leal said. When infected mosquitoes take a blood meal, they transmit the virus to their hosts, which include birds, humans, horses, dogs, cats, bats, chipmunks, skunks, squirrels and domestic rabbits. Since 1999, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have recorded 29,397 human cases and 1,147 fatalities in the United States alone.

The UC Davis researchers tested hundreds of naturally occurring compounds emitted by people and birds. They collected chemical odors from 16 adult human subjects, representing multiple races and ethnic groups.

"We then determined the specificity and sensitivity of the olfactory receptor neurons to the isolated compounds on the antennae of the mosquitoes," Syed said.

Leal and Syed found that nonanal acts synergistically with carbon dioxide, a known mosquito attractant. "We baited mosquito traps with a combination of nonanal and carbon dioxide and we were drawing in as many as 2,000 a night in Yolo County, near Davis," Syed said. "Nonanal, in combination with carbon dioxide, increased trap captures by more than 50 percent, compared to traps baited with carbon dioxide alone."

The UC Davis research was funded in part by the National Institutes of Health; a cooperative research agreement with Bedoukian Research, a supplier of specialty aroma and flavor ingredients headquartered in Connecticut; and the National Science Foundation.

Science Video

Share   Blog

Print   Email   Bookmark

Pollution Killing Flower's Fragrance
Environmental Scientists Fume About Disappearing Flower Fragrances

August 1, 2008 — Biochemists have shown that air pollution inhibits the distance that flower's fragrances can travel. Scent molecules usually travel easily in the air, but pollutants break them apart, which destroys the smell. The researchers found that these delicate odors responsible for attracting bees and other pollinating insects are traveling as little as one-third of their former distances.

Soon, it may be harder to stop and smell the roses. Something is killing off flower's sweet smell. Now, we can discover what the culprit is.

Ah, the sweet smell of flowers can be hard to resist. When you go and visit a garden the first temptation you have is to smell a flower, explains Jose Fuentes, Ph.D., atmospheric scientist University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Va.

But hurry up and catch a whiff while you still can.

Atmospheric and environmental scientists report that flower's scents are being destroyed. What's to blame for the disappearing aromas? Pollution. Fumes from cars and factories are pumping pollutants into the air, which may be destroying flower's fragrances.

"What we find is that these fragrances only travel one-third of the distance that they used to travel," Dr. Fuentes says.

Flowers produce scent molecules that travel easily in the air. Pollutants break apart the fragrance molecules, destroying their smell. Our noses will miss the pleasant fragrance, but bee's depend on it.

"The pollinators are spending more time trying to locate food and less time trying to actually harvest food that they need," Dr. Fuentes notes.

Wiping out flower scents could have a major impact on bee populations. But we can help bring back the bees and flower smells.

Dr. Fuentes explains, "One specific action that we can take is to really work towards having a very clean environment."

Flower populations may also diminish because plants need bee's to pollinate that allows flowers to reproduce. Now, we can make a clean effort for a chance to smell the flowers.

Bumblebees Learn The Sweet Smell Of Foraging Success

ScienceDaily (Oct. 27, 2008) — Bumblebees use flower scent to guide their nest-mates to good food sources, according to scientists from Queen Mary, University of London.

For any animal, finding food on its own can be time consuming and inefficient; social animals such as bees reduce these problems by informing their peers of plentiful sites, and 'recruiting' them to the search.

Honeybees use their waggle-dance to tell nest-mates the distance and direction of a food source. But bumblebees can't communicate geographical information in this way; instead, they release a recruitment pheromone in the nest to encourage their colleagues to venture out in search of food. But where should they look?

Mathieu Molet, Lars Chittka and Nigel Raine from the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences wanted to discover if this recruitment pheromone helped bees to learn which specific flowers were most rewarding at that time. They exposed bumblebee colonies to an anise scent mixed with recruitment pheromone and monitored their foraging patterns.

Bees learned that anise-scented flowers were the most rewarding. They learned this best when the flower smell was brought back to the nest by another 'demonstrator' bee, but they could also learn it when the anise odour entered the nest as either scented nectar or simply scent in the air.

Dr Raine explains: "Successful bees motivate their sisters to find food by running excitedly around the nest, buzzing and releasing pheromone. They bring home the scent of the flowers they visited which fills the air and flavours the honey. The other bees leave the nest and search for nectar-rich flowers with the same smell."

The presence of recruitment pheromone did not affect how well bees learned a new flower scent. However, the pheromone increases foraging activity in bumblebee colonies, which could increase the effectiveness of these bees pollinating important commercial crops such as tomatoes.

J Agric Food Chem. 2006 Nov 29;54(24):9201-5.

New constituents related to 3-methyl-2,4-nonanedione identified in green tea.

Naef R, Jaquier A, Velluz A, Maurer B.

Firmenich SA, Corporate R&D Division, P.O. Box 239, CH-1211 Geneva 8, Switzerland. rfnaef@bluewin.ch

Cheese trial next after bakers slash salt with ‘micro’ particles

By Elaine Watson, 11-Aug-2010

The firm behind a new breed of microscopic salt crystals that can help manufacturers slash sodium and retain their clean label status is conducting its first trials on cheese.

The UK’s leading plant bakers have all completed technical trials with the tiny salt crystals, which have been engineered by Nottingham-based Eminate using patent-pending technology that changes the structure of salt crystals to create free-flowing, microscopic hollow balls with the consistency of talc.

At 5-10 microns, they are a fraction of the size of standard salt (c.200-500 microns), and deliver an intense hit on the taste buds, enabling plant bakers to cut salt by more than 50% without impacting volume, texture or weight, claims the firm.

Bakers have also achieved significant increases in shelf-life as the tiny salt crystals cross-link gluten in dough more effectively, helping to lock in moisture.

While Eminate had initially focused on the bakery sector for its micro salt - dubbed SodaLo - work was now progressing with cheese, sausages, crisps, sauces, soups and bakery premixes, business sales manager Kevin Wilson told FoodManufacture.co.uk.

“We’re conducting trials on cheddar at the moment with a relatively large dairy company, and we’ve done a lot of work on snacks and other products.”

Retail brand launch

It is also developing a retail brand that it hopes to bring to the market within three months, he said. “SodaLo is for the b2b sector, but we want to differentiate our product in the retail sector as it is very different from other salt replacers, which typically use potassium chloride.

“We are still selling salt – it’s just smaller – so the message for consumers is more like ‘one shake instead of two’."

The tiny crystals, which are manufactured in the UK using technology developed by Eminate’s technical director Dr Stephen Minter, were more expensive than salt, but competitively priced compared with other salt replacers, he claimed.

Their clean-label status (they can be listed as ‘salt’ on labels) was their real USP, he said. “People don’t want to use potassium chloride, flavour enhancers, nucleic acid, yeast extracts and peptides.”

Small - but not hygroscopic

It is well-known that the smaller the crystals, the higher the salt perception. However, simply grinding salt to make the particles smaller is no good as they lose their free-flowing properties and stick together.

Eminate has overcome this problem through changing the structure of salt crystals to create free-flowing, microscopic hollow balls.

Trials of the same technology on sodium bicarbonate – which is responsible for high sodium levels in some cakes – had also proved successful, offering bakers the opportunity to reduce sodium in a wider range of products, claimed Minter.

“We have also been experimenting with encapsulating flavours, colours and bioactives such as pharmaceuticals within the balls.”

Contact the editor