2023 November

Beer sales in Europe were up in 2022, beating 2021 and 2020 levels but still not yet reaching pre-COVID levels of 2019.

A 17th-century hospital crypt in Milan, Italy, has yielded the first archaeological evidence of cannabis's psychoactive components in human bones

In what is a hugely promising sign for securing and boosting food production, a large-scale field study has demonstrated how treating farmland soil with mycorrhizal fungi can improve crop yields of maize by 40%, without the use of any additional fertilizers or pesticides.

BACKGROUND The organoleptic profile of an olive oil is a fundamental quality parameter obtained by human sensory panels. In this work, a portable electronic nose was employed to predict the fruity a...

Results challenge assumption we eat highly processed foods because they are more desirable, says study’s author

COVID-19 can disrupt your sense of smell and taste, but parosmia often improves with time. Continue reading to learn more.

Horseradish is decidedly not horse food and shouldn't be. So where on Earth did the association come from?

Have you ever wondered why some foods are canned in tin while others are canned in aluminum? There's a scientific reason behind this, and both types are useful.

A team has solved the mystery of the water balloon-like bladder cells that cover quinoa and other plants.

Certain countries may come to mind when you think of big beer culture, but you probably can't guess which country actually produces the most beer in the world.

It's complicated.

Forty years of progress in the fields of gas chromatography and data collection have culminated in flavoromics. This is a combination of chemometrics and metabolomics. Essentially, it is the non-targeted way of rapidly collecting a significant amount of data from a wide range of sample populations and using the data to study complicated topics. Now that we have the required tools, we can carry out high-throughput trace investigations that incorporate both gustatory and olfactory signals. Flavoro

We've been eating bananas wrong!

"Thirty years I've been in cocoa—and this is the worst season yet," said Siaka Sylla as he contemplated an almost empty warehouse at his cooperative in Ivory Coast, the world's top producer of the bean.

A combination of machine learning and lab experiments has given researchers a peek into the different languages bacteria use to communicate. Understanding how bacteria communicate—and when they can't—has ...

The use of professional social networking sites such as LinkedIn can stir up feelings of self-doubt, research suggests.

Upcycled food is increasingly promoted as a strategy for repurposing food that would otherwise be wasted. Understanding the environmental, social, and…

A central challenge in olfaction is understanding how the olfactory system detects and distinguishes odorants with diverse physicochemical properties and molecular configurations. Vertebrate animals perceive odors via G protein-coupled odorant receptors (ORs). In humans, ∼400 ORs enable the sense of smell. The OR family is composed of two major classes: Class I ORs are tuned to carboxylic acids while Class II ORs, representing the vast majority of the human repertoire, respond to a wide variety of odorants. How ORs recognize chemically diverse odorants remains poorly understood. A fundamental bottleneck is the inability to visualize odorant binding to ORs. Here, we uncover fundamental molecular properties of odorant-OR interactions by employing engineered ORs crafted using a consensus protein design strategy. Because such consensus ORs (consORs) are derived from the 17 major subfamilies of human ORs, they provide a template for modeling individual native ORs with high sequence and structural homology. The biochemical tractability of consORs enabled four cryoEM structures of distinct consORs with unique ligand recognition properties. The structure of a Class I consOR, consOR51, showed high structural similarity to the native human receptor OR51E2 and yielded a homology model of a related member of the human OR51 family with high predictive power. Structures of three Class II consORs revealed distinct modes of odorant-binding and activation mechanisms between Class I and Class II ORs. Thus, the structures of consORs lay the groundwork for understanding molecular recognition of odorants by the OR superfamily. ### Competing Interest Statement H.M. has received royalties from Chemcom, research grants from Givaudan, and consultant fees from Kao. A.M. is a founder of Epiodyne and Stipple Bio, consults for Abalone, and serves on the scientific advisory board of Septerna.

Peruvian cuisine is worth getting to know, and in no small part due to its delicious, spicy peppers. We're here to help you learn more about these nightshades.

The human tongue detected it long before it could say it.

This is the story of how clunky grocery store checkouts were revolutionized by the barcode, and which grocery item was the first to use this technology.

Do you like cod, shrimp, salmon, crab or pollock (also known as fish sticks)? Of course you do. Do you shop at Walmart, Costco, Kroger or Albertsons for fish? Who doesn't? Do you eat at one of the more ...

Most households in America used to keep orange juice concentrate in the freezer, but it's quickly sinking into obscurity for a few reasons.

It's a noisy world yet we somehow cope in the cocktail party of life.

Cranberries add color and acidity to Thanksgiving menus, but they also have many interesting botanical and genetic features.

For millennia, Tyrian purple was the most valuable colour on the planet. Then the recipe to make it was lost. By piecing together ancient clues, could one man bring it back?

Although it's unlikely people will turn away from drinking coffee, cacao is an energizing alternative with gentler, longer-lasting effects than a cup of joe.

While consumers are spending less, inflation continues to boost FMCG sales. A new report finds growth and resilience are possible through strategic pricing structures that support new product development (NPD) and sustainability.