Time to Address Functional Foods and Nutraceuticals

What do the terms functional foods and nutraceuticals mean? Why does this subject conjure up so much excitement for the future?

Are we talking about hocus-pocus science or real investigations? Who is involved? Are we talking only about herbs and oils? Why are nutritionists looking at this area? Why are engineers running their calculations? Why are law professors cringing with apprehension? There are far more questions than answers.

If we ask people in our field what functional foods and nutraceuti…