Modelling Edible Oils: Functionality, Oil Binding Capacity And The Nanoscale - A New Frontier For Soft Condensed-Matter Physicists?

摘要

It is appropriate on the twentieth anniversary of the coining of the term "molecular gastronomy" by University of Oxford physicist Nicholas Kurti and INRA chemist Hervé This to return to the theme of the role of physics in Food Science. The adoption of new techniques in food preparation for consumption gave rise to groups which rejected the term "molecular gastronomy",preferring names such as "Culinary physics", "Culinary constructivism" and "Techno-emo- tional cuisine", to name only three~([1]). Two years later, the review paper by Athene Donald ~(~([2])) and a subsequent paper~([3]) provided a relatively fundamental description of food characteristics from the point of view of physics and chemistry. In 2005, Mezzenga et al.~([4])described food as soft condensed matter with the presence of colloids, aggregation and gels, foams and bubbles, and the realization of self-assembly. Indeed, food is becoming a new frontier for soft condensed matter physicists as seen in the recent Faraday Discussions meeting~([5]). The scientific study of food is rapidly becoming even more of a multidisciplinary field than it.was a decade ago, one in which van der Waals and electrostatic interactions, self-assembly and phase transitions play key roles, and experimental techniques such as ultra small-angle X-ray (or neutron) scattering are beginning to be used.