Symposium honors Karel; Getting to know Laura Willis

IFT members become IAFoST Fellows
The International Union of Food Science and Technology (IUFoST) announced the 10th class of food scientists and technologists to be elected to the International Academy of Food Science and Technology (IAFoST). These new Fellows will be inducted during the 18th World Congress of Food Science and Technology, taking place Aug. 21–25 in Dublin.

Among the 30 new Fellows are 16 members of the Institute of Food Technologists. They are: Lilia Ahrne, director, Dept. for Process & Technology Development, SIK, Sweden; V.M. Balasubramaniam, professor of food engineering, The Ohio State University, United States; Leon Gorris, regulatory affairs director, Unilever, The Netherlands; Purwiyatno Hariyadi, director, Bogor Agricultural University, Indonesia; Marc Hendrickx, professor, KU Leuven, Belgium; Olga Martin-Belloso, professor, University of Lleida, Spain; Narendra Narain, professor, Universidade Federal de Sergipe, Brazil; Hyun Jin Park, professor, Korea University, Korea; Yrjö Roos, professor of food technology, University College, Ireland; Joseph Scimeca, vice-president, Global Regulatory & Scientific Affairs, Cargill, United States; Xianming Shi, professor, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China; Petros Taoukis, professor, National Technical University of Athens, Greece; Purnendu Vasavada, professor, University of Wisconsin–River Falls, United States; Chin Kun Wang, professor, Chung Shan Medical University, Taiwan; Youling Xiong, professor, University of Kentucky, United States; Weibiao Zhou, professor, National University of Singapore, Singapore.

Nominations for each new roster are made by IUFoST Adhering Bodies and IAFoST Fellows. Fellows elected to IAFoST are acknowledged by their peers as outstanding representatives of international food science and technology. The IAFoST collectively forms a pool of scientific expertise in food science and technology from which IUFoST draws nonaligned expert advice on scientific matters. Fellows serve as independent persons to work and promote high standards of ethics and scientific endeavors.

McLellan to head USDA council
The U.S. Dept. of Agriculture (USDA) appointed Mark McLellan, vice-president for research and dean of graduate studies at Utah State University, as the inaugural chairman of its Science Advisory Council (SAC), which is part of the Office of the Chief Scientist at USDA. In the council’s first year, it will focus on reproducibility and transparency in science, gene editing and other emerging technologies, and crowd sourcing and citizen science.

According to McLellan, the SAC was created in response to a recommendation set forth in the President’s Council of Science and Technology’s “Report to the President on Agricultural Preparedness and the Agriculture Research Enterprise” from December 2012. The council, which has been formed under the current National Agricultural Research, Extension, Education, and Economics Advisory (NAREEE) Board, will provide advice and guidance in science to the Office of the Chief Scientist, USDA.

“I am honored to serve in this role and proud as a food scientist and past president of IFT to be representing my discipline and all agricultural science disciplines in this role. What sometimes seems to be a ‘drive by shooting’ of sound science must be countered by a very real commitment from scientists to ensure that strong reliable data and analysis is made available to policy makers and citizens,” says McLellan. “I am hopeful that this Science Advisory Council will help to strengthen the Office of the Chief Scientist with advice that is thoughtful, probing, and dependable.”

The council includes representation from many national level organizations, including the National Food Animal Science Society; the National Crop, Soil, Agronomy, Horticulture or Weed Science Society; the National Human Health Assoc.; and the National Nutritional Science Society.

Student members win travel grants
The International Association for Food Protection (IAFP) will grant student travel scholarships to several IFT student members to attend IAFP 2016 in St. Louis. Congratulations to Kaitlyn Casulli, Wan Mei Leong, Thabile Nkambule, Lily Yang, and Claire Zoellner.

NSF recognizes IFT members
NSF International, a global public health and safety organization that provides food safety and quality assurance services across all food supply chain sectors, announced the winners of the 2016 NSF Food Safety Leadership Awards during the 2016 Food Safety Summit in Rosemont, Ill.

IFT professional member John N. Butts, vice-president, research, Land O’ Frost, and president, Food Safety by Design, and IFT emeritus professional member Purnendu C. Vasavada, professor emeritus, University of Wisconsin–River Falls, both received Lifetime Achievement Awards. IFT member Judy A. Harrison, professor and extension food safety specialist, University of Georgia Dept. of Foods and Nutrition, was presented with the Training and Education award.

“In presenting these awards, we honor the recipients for their contributions to food safety and the protection of public health. The work of John Butts, Purnendu Vasavada, and Judy Harrison has contributed to important advances in food safety innovation, pathogen mitigation, education, and training. Their leadership and enthusiasm in applying science-based methods, sharing information across the industry, collaborating, and training to help solve vital food safety issues embodies the spirit of NSF International’s Food Safety Leadership Awards,” says Kevan P. Lawlor, NSF International president and chief executive officer.

Larkin wins food safety award
John Larkin, director of research at the University of Minnesota’s Food Protection and Defense Institute, will receive Food Safety Magazine’s Distinguished Service Award at the International Assoc. for Food Protection’s annual meeting. The award honors individuals who have made a significant impact on food safety for their collective efforts in promoting and advancing science-based solutions for food safety issues.

Larkin, a professional member of IFT, identifies strategic initiatives and research needs at the Institute and assists industry and government agencies with addressing food protection and defense issues. In his previous role as associate director of research at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), he evaluated regulatory issues for technology used to preserve food, particularly shelf-stable food and extended shelf-life products. He was also previously an assistant professor of food engineering at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and received his PhD in food engineering from Michigan State University.

Workshop spreads food science education
A group of IFT members at FONA International are sharing the power of food science education through a community workshop program. Discover FONA, which was formally created in 2012, welcomes area teachers, students, and community members to FONA’s headquarters for a day of demos and education. The demonstrations, which center around analytical chemistry, culinary topics, and sensory science, give teachers in particular an arsenal of tools to bring the subjects they teach to life; during an April session, teachers walked away with instructions for 13 demos they could bring back to their classrooms.

“You’re showing [teachers] something practical that they’re talking to their kids about every day,” says IFT member Katie Sudler, community education director at FONA, who runs the program with help from IFT members Jacqueline Finner, Kristin Frankowski, Gabriella Mahnke, and Robert M. Sobel.

Part of the program’s goal is to create advocates for the industry in the teachers and community members who take part in the course. Sudler explains that while she can’t control what a student takes away from the session, if she can connect with a teacher, “[the information] grows new legs. It lives for many, many years and touches so many different kids because they can take that information and incorporate it into how they teach and what they talk to their students about and help guide [them].”

Discover FONA also aims to expose students to a career path they may not have considered. Special sessions have explained the range of career opportunities available within the food science industry, from finance and human resources to chemistry and production, adds Finner, a junior flavorist at FONA. In addition, FONA employs two high-school interns whose school had participated in the program; the young women each have their own long-term projects to work on every week.

In the program, Sudler works to reduce the science of food to its most basic forms—as a kind of chemistry—in order to help students and adults alike understand that chemicals are not something they should inherently fear. As a result, some community members have walked away less scared of “big food” and with a greater awareness of the role different components play in creating food. “These are our consumers,” says Finner, explaining why it’s so important to connect with the public. “These are the people that are going to start the next trends.

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Symposium honors Karel
The European Academy of Food Engineering (EAFE) organized an international Food Engineering for Life symposium honoring Professor Emeritus Marcus Karel at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on May 17, which coincided with his 88th birthday. EAFE presented Karel with a plaque sponsored by IFT, which was handed to him by IFT Past President Theodore P. Labuza, who was Karel’s first PhD student at MIT.

In his opening remarks, event organizer Yrjö H. Roos called Karel a “top class” educator, researcher, adviser, consultant, and academic. Karel is known for his significant and outstanding contributions to food engineering, food processing, and physical chemistry of foods. Addressing the symposium, Karel shared highlights from his path within food engineering. Karel, a Holocaust survivor who came to the United States in 1951, saw what MIT was doing in food technology and decided to go there and become a laboratory assistant while he finished his undergraduate studies at Boston University.

After receiving his PhD from MIT in 1960, he became a professor of food engineering and chemical engineering, and he believed that engineering and physical chemistry “were the package that you needed in order to have a rational basis for providing scientific background for food performances.” From 1989 to 1996, Karel served as the State of New Jersey Professor of Food Science at Rutgers University, and he was named professor emeritus at both MIT and Rutgers University in 1996.

Labuza gave a talk at the event that covered the historical highlights of food engineering over the years, beginning with Nicolas Appert’s canning discovery in 1810 to the work Labuza, Karel, and others have done at MIT, such as creating the retort pouch and understanding the physical-chemical application of water activity. “We were pioneers here at MIT in developing a principle that became important to the whole food field,” he said.

Commentaries were also presented by IFT emeritus professional members Micha Peleg, James Behnke, Daryl Lund, and Dennis Heldman and IFT professional member Jozef L. Kokini. IFT emeritus professional members José M. Aguilera and Sam Saguy and IFT professional member Bernadette Piacek-Llanes also highlighted the importance of food engineering to academia, industry, and the consumer.

Karel, an emeritus member of IFT, has been part of IFT since 1962. He was recognized with the William V. Cruess Award in 1970, named an IFT Fellow in 1972, and received the Nicolas Appert Award in 1986. He has served on an IFT Awards jury and chaired the Stephen S. Chang Award Committee and the Graduate Scholarship Committee. He has been a member of many other committees and panels, including the Program Committee, the Research Committee, and the Expert Panel on Food Safety & Nutrition.

Getting to Know Laura Willis
Each month, we meet one of IFT’s valued volunteers.

For Laura Willis, volunteering with IFT has centered around communication. In her role as student representative to the International Division, Willis has learned ways to more easily communicate with people across all fields of food science. “The International Division is great because it is not specific to any one area of food science and really is just about encouraging people to share ideas and technology with colleagues around the world,” she says, adding that volunteering has helped networking feel more natural to her.

In addition, Willis’s participation in the 2015 Food Communicators Workshop at IFT has played an instrumental role in her life. During the workshop, Willis and her fellow participants bonded over the difficulties they face in communicating the value of food science to a world that is increasingly afraid of chemical-sounding names. “The speakers really engaged us and created such an enthusiastic atmosphere that before we had left the workshop, we were all certain that we wanted to work together and create our own food communication group,” she explains.

The group created Don’t Eat the Pseudoscience, a platform that aims to make food easier to understand. “What I enjoy the most about our group is our enthusiasm for working together to try and explain some of the myths and misconceptions out there about food,” she notes. [Visit facebook.com/DontEatPseudo to follow the conversation.]

Between her volunteering and her work at Ferrara Pan formulating new candies, Willis’s world is filled with food science, and she works to find balance, which she says involves “very serious prioritization.” She encourages members to look for roles that speak to their personal interests and reach out to divisions, who are always happy to have more people involved. “The most important thing is to enjoy your volunteering and do what you actually have time for,” she says. “Apply for scholarships and workshops—whatever you find that interests you! You can never be sure where volunteer activities may lead you!”

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