2024 5+6

Goldenrod can perceive other plants nearby without ever touching them, by sensing far-red light ratios reflected off leaves. When goldenrod is eaten by herbivores, it adapts its response based on whether ...

En les privant plus ou moins temporairement de leur odorat, la pandémie de Covid-19 a révélé à des milliers de personnes l’importance de leur système olfactif. La recherche s’efforce maintenant de

BBQ, hickory and smoky bacon-flavored potato chips enjoy considerable popularity, often ranking amongst consumers super likes. But that’s about to go up in smoke.

Hanni Rützler erklärt, welche Foodtrends uns im nächsten Jahr erwarten und warum unsere Essensvorlieben immer auch ein Spiegel unserer Sehnsüchte sind

Based on fractal patterns in neurons, researchers believe our brains exist at or near a state called criticality where they're extremely close to shifting from one state of matter to another. They also admit they don't know what either state is.

Ian Sample hears from Linda Geddes about her recent trip to the Netherlands to try cultivated meat sausages, courtesy of the company Meatable. Advocates say that cultivated meat could be the future of sustainable and ethical meat production. Linda explains how they’re made, how their carbon footprint compares with traditional meat and most importantly … what they taste like!

Forming meaningful bonds with others can improve your health, make you mentally sharper, and fuel creativity. Making friends can feel daunting, but research shows there are many ways to build better connections.

Whether you love or hate them, salt and vinegar chips are here to stay. Learn the history behind the flavor and the science behind how they're made.

A team of chemical and biological engineers at Seoul National University in the Republic of Korea has developed a proof-of-concept device that could one day lead to the creation of an artificial nose.

A new study suggests that consuming energy drinks may be linked to potential heart attack risk. Read this article to learn more.

"Extreme caution" urged as at least 8 people in 4 states sickened, 6 hospitalized.

From ancient Arab cultivators to Dutch breeders, the history of carrots spans continents and centuries, transforming this humble root into a global culinary staple.

Food adulteration became a potential threat to the food industries and human health. The conventional laboratory techniques are time and cost intensiv…

America’s food waste problem is hard to wrap your head around. These four charts help.

The high volatility and hydrophobicity of cinnamon essential oils (CiEO) limited their practical application. To enhance their stability and antibacte…

Sommeliers, winemakers and brewers pride themselves on their craft: built up over decades of experience and training. Could AI take their place?

The 2024 list of The World's 50 Best Restaurants has just been released, and the experimental Barcelona-based restaurant Disfrutar takes first place.

Dark chocolate can sometimes contain traces of cadmium and lead, but a study finds that consuming an ounce per day poses no risk for adults.

Pineapple aroma is one of the most important sensory quality traits that influences consumer purchasing patterns. Reported in this paper is a high thr…

The swirl of milk and espresso—a small storm in your mug—doesn't impact the dynamics of the milk proteins, according to research published in ACS Food Science & Technology.

Car tires contain hundreds of chemical additives that can leach out of them. This is how they end up in crops and subsequently in the food chain. Researchers at the Center for Microbiology and Env ...

Ian Sample hears from the Observer science and environment editor, Robin McKie, and from Glenn Stone, a research professor of environmental science at Sweet Briar College in Virginia who is also an anthropologist who has studied golden rice, about why it has taken so long for this potentially life-saving technology to reach the fields, if it is the silver bullet so many had hoped for, and whether this ban is really the end of the story

Wilderton Spirits isn’t trying to make an alcohol dupe. They’re doing something completely different—one botanical at a time.

Efforts to curb the amount of sodium we eat have mostly failed, so governments must now try a new strategy: adding potassium to table salt

Is the quest for the perfect top notes responsible for some of the world's most influential scientific discoveries? A new article in the journal Isis argues that fragrance research has stimulated scientific ...

Fully refrigerated food supply chains worldwide could eliminate nearly half of global food waste, or about 620 million metric tons.

Many microbes and cells are in deep sleep, waiting for the right moment to activate. Biologists discovered a widespread protein that abruptly shuts down a cell’s activity — and turns it back on just as fast.

From herbs that have gone extinct to seasonings are still popular in other parts of the world, here are spices that are underutilized in the U.S.

There's no shortage of ways to get your coffee fix, even in the most extreme locations. There's also no shortage of startups and inventors coming up with more, often unusual ways, to serve it. Arriving this month is yet another option aimed specifically at climbers, backpackers and all-around outdoor adventurers. Called No Normal, the new coffee style takes the form of a tube of dissolvable paste that can be mixed with water in a cup, spread onto breakfast pastries or simply gobbled straight out of the tube. It's one of the fastest, easiest ways to get a morning dose of caffeine before pushing off farther into the wild (or urban jungle).

Nasal xenobiotic metabolizing enzymes (XMEs) are important for the sense of smell because they influence odorant availability and quality. Since the major part of the human nasal cavity is lined by a respiratory mucosa, we hypothesized that this tissue contributed to nasal odorant metabolism through XME activity. Thus, we built human respiratory tissue models and characterized the XME profiles using single-cell RNA sequencing. We focused on the XMEs dicarbonyl and l-xylulose reductase, aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH) 1A1, and ALDH3A1, which play a role in food odorant metabolism. We demonstrated protein abundance and localization in the tissue models and showed the metabolic activity of the corresponding enzyme families by exposing the models to the odorants 3,4-hexandione and benzaldehyde. Using gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry, we observed, for example, a significantly higher formation of the corresponding metabolites 4-hydroxy-3-hexanone (39.03 ± 1.5%, p = 0.0022), benzyl alcohol (10.05 ± 0.88%, p = 0.0008), and benzoic acid (8.49 ± 0.57%, p = 0.0004) in odorant-treated tissue models compared to untreated controls (0 ± 0, 0.12 ± 0.12, and 0.18 ± 0.18%, respectively). This is the first study that reveals the XME profile of tissue-engineered human respiratory mucosa models and demonstrates their suitability to study nasal odorant metabolism.