Karin Petersson

🧬SEQUENCING 130-YEAR OLD STARTER CULTURE 🧈 Two bottles from the 1890's filled with white powder, that were found in a basement beneath the old Agricultural College here on our campus, have given us a unique insight into Denmark's butter production history. The bottles turned out to contain starter cultures for butter. In the bottles, the researchers found DNA from Lactococcus cremoris - a lactic acid bacterium that is still used to acidify milk in modern dairy production. The analysis also revealed that the bacterial culture had genes to produce diacetyl - a flavor compound that gives a characteristic butter aroma. “This shows that even back then, they had bacteria with precisely the properties that are desirable in the fermented milk products we have today,” says Professor Dennis S. Nielsen. The study has been done in collaboration with the Department of Veterinary and Animal Sciences (IVH), and it gives us a glimpse into the beginning of standardized butter production, which Denmark began to export to England on a large scale at the end of the 19th century. “The starter culture became the key to standardized butter production. It was no longer possible for each dairy to ferment in its own way—it was necessary to ensure that the products tasted the same, regardless of where in the country the butter was made. The starter culture made the taste reproducible,” explains Jørgen Leisner from IVH. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/ejYv9PbV

503

4 kommentarer

"Only a few supermarkets wanted to participate in her research. When she saw the results, she realized why!" I promise, this very "clickbaity" headline in Jyllands-Posten today leads to a very serious article on our recent publication in Nature Scientific Reports on multibuy offers and food waste. We show in an experiment with Swedish supermarkets that multibuy offers increase unintentional purchases and provide evidence that this increases food waste. While REMA1000, who have dropped multibuy offers several years ago, confirm that they can have a profitable business without these offers, Salling Group, that owns Føtex, Bilka and Netto says: "Vores varer og tilbud er netop det – tilbud –, og det er den enkelte kunde, der beslutter, hvad der kommer i kurven." Loosely translated as: "it's not our problem if people make use of these offers and buy more than they need." Pushing the responsibility for food waste back on the consumer. Yes, nobody is forced to buy more than one product or any product at all, but what our study, and a huge literature in behavioral economics, clearly shows is that is is cognitively hard for people to make rational decisions when confronted with offers like these. Supermarkets and their marketing practices are also responsible for food waste at home.

184

17 kommentarer

From chicken alternatives to CO₂-eating microbes- congrats to our researchers at DTU Biosustain who have won Innovation Grants from the Novo Nordisk Foundation!👏 Here is what they will work on👇 🔬 Onur Kırtel Onur is engineering hyperstable enzymes that thrive under extreme industrial conditions found in carbon capture, utilization and storage.His team will use directed evolution to discover biocatalysts that survive heat, solvents and high pH - opening up possibilities for sustainable CO₂ conversion: 💬 “The project will allow us to evolve robust enzymes for CCUS, advancing directed evolution and unlocking enzyme families with untapped industrial potential.” 🧫 Emil Damgaard Jensen Emil’s team will expand a yeast-based biotechnology platform to identify vaccine candidates against fungal pathogens.Using high-throughput screening with yeast surface display, his team’s research could lead to safer, more effective antifungal vaccine candidates. 💬 “This is an outstanding opportunity to mature one of our established yeast-based cell-cell communication platforms towards commercialization for benefitting people and society.” 🥬 Leonie Johanna Jahn Leonie’s project is transforming a food sidestream into a sustainable chicken alternative.With the product already developed and nutritionally characterized, the next step is ensuring food safety, shelf life, and scalability - bringing this climate-friendly food closer to real world applications. 💬 “This grant will allow us to evaluate safety and production parameters of our chicken alternative and create a solid knowledge foundation for potential next steps.” 🧪 Enrico Orsi Enrico is scaling up a microbial bioprocess that turns CO₂ and renewable energy into valuable chemical building blocks -a potential game-changer for the packaging industry.His team will move from lab-scale to pilot-scale production in advanced bioreactors. 💬 “It’s a great opportunity to bridge the gap between strain engineering and process development and essential for real-world application.” 🧬 Daniel Volke Daniel’s team has invented a cell-free, ultra-high-throughput screening system to rapidly discover new enzymes. This innovation bypasses the need for living cells, allowing for faster, more resource-efficient selection of enzyme candidates with industrial potential. 💬 “This allows us to demonstrate the broad applicability of our cell-free enzyme screening platform, which combines speed, scalability and reduced resource input -paving the way toward market-ready biocatalyst discovery pipelines.” 🌿 Lei Yang Lei uses microbial fermentation to enhance the nutritional profile of plant-based diets.Her project targets essential nutrients often lacking in alternative proteins-supporting healthier, more complete diets that reduce reliance on animal-based food. 💬 “We anticipate that more complete nutritional profiles of alternative foods will accelerate broad market adoption and reduce the environmental impact of food systems.”

286

19 kommentarer

Can a brownie help reduce iron deficiency and food waste? 🍫🩸 At Torsåker Farm – Axfoundation's development center for future food and materials – Axfoundation together with chefs, researchers, and nutritionists, has developed a new kind of Swedish “fika” through the project Blood & Turnip: A brownie made with 20% Swedish cattle blood. Why blood? – Nearly half of slaughter by-products from cattle and pigs that could become food are instead turned into biogas or feed. Only 3% of cattle blood from slaughter is currently used in food. – The Blood Brownie contains 20% cattle blood, replacing eggs, and whole-grain rye flour instead of refined wheat. A 20 g brownie contains 1.9 mg iron, equal to 13% of the recommended daily intake for women of childbearing age. 💫 This innovation transforms an underused byproduct into a yummy chocolate treat – combining taste, improving nutrition and sustainability. By taking full anatomical responsibility, partners across the food chain aim to reduce pre-retail food waste and demonstrate a more resource-efficient, healthy, and circular food system. 🤝 The Blood & Turnip project is led by IVL Svenska Miljöinstitutet in collaboration with Axfoundation, #FöreningenMatsvinnet, Ipsos and SLU - Sveriges lantbruksuniversitet. #Acttoinspire #Inspiretoact #Bloodbrownie

158

6 kommentarer