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Nanofiction Or Nanotopia?
BY MICHELLE VAN ROOST
The coming revolution in molecular manufacturing may improve the
1 September 2005
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Nanotechnology is a booming business. The global food nanotechnology market—packaging, food products, machinery and lab equipment—will soar from almost US$2.5 billion today to an estimated US$18.5 billion in 2010. This was stated in the “Nanotechnology in Food and Food Processing Industry Worldwide” report of Helmut Kaisers Consultancy.
This German bureau, which specialises in technology in genera, forecasts that the number of food-related companies using nanotechnology will increase worldwide from 69 in 2000 to a fewthousand in 2010.
Meanwhile, several food companies have started to invest heavily in nanotechnology. For example, in 1999 Kraft Foods opened the industry’s first nanotech food laboratory. According to Kraft’s director and senior scientist Dr Manuel Marquez, ‘Nanotechnology is going to find broad, sweeping application, as it has the potential to improve the quality and safety of food significantly. The first area nanotechnology will impact upon in the food industry is food packaging. Nanocomposites address spoilage and flavour issues, weigh less and have better recycleability.’
Additional hurdle
The use of lactoferrin in packaging and processing is an example of nanotechnology as a food safety application. This iron-binding protein, found in milk, has the capability not only to inhibit the growth of pathogenic bacteria but also to detach bacteria from surfaces and seal those surfaces to prevent reattachment of bacteria. According to Dr David Clark, director of R&D/QA of DMV International: ‘This new development is now being used as an additional hurdle technology in meat by a major meat processor in the US.’
In 2003, Dutch dairy manufacturer Campina launched Vifit Calcimel in the Netherlands. According According to Hans Westerbeek, R&D/QA manager of Campina Netherlands: ‘This calcium-enriched fermented dairy drink contains a milk mineral complex at submicron level thavt is enabled by nanotechnology.’ Enriching milk with ‘just’ calcium salts would give the drink a ‘sandy’ mouth feel, and the insoluble calcium salts would precipitate as well, leading to unequal amounts of calcium per serving. ‘This is all due to particle size, ‘ says Westerbeek.
Potential risks
While food producers are investing in the advantages of nanotechnology, who is investigating the consequences in the meantime? In other words, are ‘nanofoods’ safe? One would think they are, as they are often admitted as regular foodstuffs. According to Frans Kampers, programme manager Bio- Nanotechnology of Wageningen University and Research Centre, the safety of the particles strongly depends on their type. Nanoparticles can be categorised into three groups: inorganic, soft and polymer particles.
At the moment, mainly inorganic particles have been studied ontheir toxic effects (Brown et al., 2000 & Donaldson et al., 2001). It was found that some inorganic nanoparticles are more reactive per unit of mass than larger particles of the same chemical composition, due to a higher surface-to-volume ratio. This means that they could damage certain cells or provoke an inflammation reaction. Furthermore, because of their small size these particles could penetrate cells more readily.
‘This does not mean products containing nanoparticles are unsafe,’ says Kampers. ‘And it should be noted that inorganic particles that are used in the food packaging industry are ‘trapped’ in the packaging material. However, it is something to keep in mind, and until we know more about the health effects, the safety of these products should be tested first.’
Moratorium
According to Kampers: ‘In foods, only soft and polymer particles are used. Although man-made, the soft particles and polymers are equal to or very much resemble particles and structures that already are natural components of food.’
‘Although there is very little literature on the effects of size of soft and polymer particles, I expect that the current regulations are adequate. However, Wageningen University will investigate the potential risks in toxicology projects that specifically look at ingested soft microand nanoparticles.’
Meanwhile, opposing groups are campaigning against nanotechnology. Two years ago one of the main opposition groups, the Erosion Technology and Concentration (ETC) Group—an international research and advocacy organisation based in Canada— called for a moratorium on the commercialisation of new nanoscale materials until laboratory protocols and regulatory regimes are in place. This moratorium was generally rejected, on the basis of findings like those of the ‘Nanoscience and nanotechnologies report’, written by the British Royal Society and Royal Academy of Engineering (RS&REA). This report was commissioned by the UK Government to investigate the safety and regulatory and ethical aspects of nanotechnology. ‘Given the appropriate regulation along the lines’ described in the report, the RS&REA sees no reason for the moratorium.
The next GM?
As stated in the RS&REA report, control seems the main advantage of nanotechnology, but also its greatest weakness. However, its name might represent another weakness. According to Tim Harper, president and CEO of Cientifica, a global business intelligence and consulting bureau, nanotechnology could become a collective term for something ‘bad’, as has happened to the terms genetic modification and irradiation. Critical consumer groups regard the widely different applications of these techniques as one single ‘evil’ technique. This risk is lurking
for nanotechnology as well, especially when con groups like ECT use terms such as ‘automatically modified foods’ and ‘the next GM’ when debating nanotechnology and its products. Therefore, on the one hand a strong effort should be made to research the risks and possible health and environmental effects, but on the other hand it should be communicated to the public what benefits these broad techniques can bring to them.
So what will it be? Nanotopia or nanofiction? Investments made by the industry indicate that the industry definitely sees advantages from nanotechnology. However, as with genetic modification, consumer acceptance is a prerequisite. Purely a technology push is not sufficient; there has to be a market pull. This can only be achieved by designing nanofoods, which make a difference to the consumer.
In the meantime, the industry should take its responsibility and be open to possible negative health and environmental effects. The GMO scenario cannot be an appealing prospect for the nanotechnology lobby.
Acknowledgement to our sister publication Food Engineering & Ingredients.
| More Information | |
| Investigating the Desired Product Molecular understanding must first be achieved before manufacturing can begin. Molecular Food Science encompasses recent developments in food research to understand the properties of food ingredients at the molecular and nanoscale level. These traditional food ingredients are natural and fully food grade, which means that they are approved for use in foodstuffs because they satisfy extremely stringent requirements concerning issues like safety, nutritional aspects and proven usefulness. Examples include carbohydrates, lipids and proteins. Such molecular understanding is needed in order to better ‘tune and control’the properties of final products.  One should be aware that many food ingredients are already structured at the nanoscale by Mother Nature. These include casein micelles and starch granules. In the past, product development was mainly done using a ‘cook-and-look’ approach. One would use a starting material Nowadays, however, product development has evolved to be based on clear consumer insights, or on precise definitions of desired product properties like nutritional value, appearance, stability and safety. From this starting point, one then investigates the various possible ways by which this product property or benefit can be realized using food ingredients food structuring and processing techniques. The advantages of this new approach are threefold: First, the target is very clear; Second, the decision on the technology by which to make the product is postponed to a late stage thus giving maximum flexibility; and Third, it provides a rational way of dealing with potentially conflicting properties of a food product (e.g. stability vs. taste, nutritional impact vs. appearance) and finds the best possible solution to a given target.
BY DR J UBBINK | ||
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