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Food Scientist
Studies the chemistry and biology of food — develops new products and ensures food safety.
Did you know?
Each Pringles chip is a saddle shape called a hyperbolic paraboloid, designed by Procter and Gamble chemist Fredric Baur to stop chips breaking.
How subjects help
- Chemistry: Work out why a sauce separates and find a natural way to keep it smooth.
- Biology: Test foods for harmful bacteria and find ways to stop them growing on the shelf.
- Mathematics: Scale a kitchen recipe up to a factory batch big enough to fill thousands of packs.
- Food Science: Develop a new snack and check how its taste and crunch hold up over months of storage.
A famous name
Mary Engle Pennington: Food scientist who pioneered refrigeration to keep food safe, and first female lab chief at the US FDA.
Try it yourself: Run a fair test with sugar
- Guess first: will sugar disappear faster in cold or warm water? Write your guess down.
- Fill one glass with cold water and one with warm tap water, the same amount in each.
- Tip a spoon of sugar into each at the same moment, stir each the same way, and time how long until it has gone.
- Was your guess right? What did you keep the same so the test was fair?
Chemists and researchers test ideas this way: change one thing, keep everything else the same, measure.
Also try: Watch a bean wake up.
Known for it in
USA, Netherlands, UK, Japan, Germany