We hope you enjoy reading the new special issue of the International Journal of Food Science and Technology (IJFST). This special issue celebrates the role of our colleagues in disseminating their research for the benefit of academia and industry alike. All of these articles are available in this special virtual issue and will be free to view until the end of 2020. Please read and share this issue with your friends and colleagues.
Read the Virtual Issue curated by Professor Charles Brennan focusing on the Globalisation of Food Science and Technology 2020 Onwards.
The year 2020 has presented many new challenges for all of us, and we have come to realise the importance of our friendships and networks with regards to work, social life and our research activities. Many of us have been unable to complete experimental activities. However, we have been able to take more time to evaluate our data, expand our networks, and keep up to date with advances in our particular fields of research. This special issue celebrates the role of our colleagues in disseminating their research for the benefit of academia and industry alike. This collection of papers reflects my perception of key global food research.
The globalisation of food science and technology has never been so much at the front line of research agendas, as mentioned in the editorial from Rhom and Aschemann‐Witzel (2019) in the special issue of the International Journal of Food Science and Technology covering the impact of food wastes in the future of the food sector. The utilisation of food by-products remains at the forefront of interest, exemplified by the potential of creating added value commodities from bio-refinery processes (Esteban and Ladero, 2018), or co-products from the meat industry to improve human nutrition (O'Flaherty et al., 2019). Indeed, the link between food and human nutrition has been an active topic for IJFST authors ranging from controlling the glycaemic impact of gluten-free foods (Giuberti, and Gallo, 2018), to the phytochemical manipulation of enzyme activity involved in nutrient release (Wadhawan, Tripathi, and Gautam, 2018), or protein digestion to create functional peptides (Spiric et al., 2018). Another popular research area has been food safety in terms of evaluation of potential contaminants such as glyphosates in foods (Gelinas, Fleur and Carole, 2018), the control of microbial foodborne pathogens (Rubio et al., 2018), biofilm production from lactobacilli (Olszewska, Nynca, and Białobrzewski, 2019), or food authenticity through novel mass spectrometry procedures (ElMasry et al., 2019).
Many researchers have also discussed innovations in food science, be it in food processing techniques such as thermal or non-thermal processes (Zhang et al., 2019), encapsulation technologies (Nizori et al., 2018), functional food ingredients including legume and cereal based components (Duta, Culetu and Sozer, 2019) or alternative algal material in food products (Dang et al., 2018). Chemical composition of these ingredients has proved essential in our appreciation of the role of phenolic compounds (Quan et al., 2018), protein composition (Bravo‐Nuñez et al., 2018) and antioxidant properties (Haileslassie, Henry, and Tyler, 2019) on consumer perception of a range of foods (Harrison, 2018).
All of these articles are available in this special virtual issue and will be free to view until the end of 2020. I hope that you can celebrate the research activities of these authors representing research from 17 countries, illustrating the global reach of food science and technology. It may be that this selection encourages you to focus your research, reach out to your colleagues throughout the world, and even start your latest submission for the International Journal of Food Science and Technology.
My kind regards,
Professor Charles Brennan
Editor in Chief of International Journal of Food Science and Technology,
Professor of Food Science and Human Nutrition, Lincoln University, New Zealand