IFIS Publishing

10/09/2025

Are you going to the NAPIC Conference this September?

IFIS Publishing is proud to be a bronze sponsor of the NAPIC Inaugural Conference, taking place 15–16 September 2025 at The Diamond, University of Sheffield.

If you are attending make sure you ask about our special conference offer of a free trial to our database, Food Science & Technology Abstracts, (FSTA). This landmark event, hosted by the National Alternative Protein Innovation Centre, brings together industry pioneers, researchers, investors, and policymakers to explore and advance alternative protein innovation—a critical frontier for sustainable, nutritious, and accessible food systems.

We'd love to connect at the conference so please drop by the IFIS Publishing stand to say hello to Carol Durham and let’s explore how we can support collaboration, research, and the future of sustainable food together.

Looking forward to an inspiring and impactful couple of days in Sheffield!

09/09/2025

At IFIS Publishing, we’re encouraged to give back. Every quarter, each member of staff is given a charity day to support a cause that matters personally to them.

For Boyd Butler, that meant stepping up at the Play for Prostate Classic Golf Day. Not on the fairway (thankfully!) but as a compere and by helping with video content creation to raise awareness and support fundraising.

It was an inspiring day bringing people together around a cause that affects so many, and I’m proud that IFIS gives us the time and space to contribute in meaningful ways.

A small reminder that work isn’t just about what we do in the office – it’s also about the impact we can make outside of it.

*Film made Samuel Jean Butler

If your organisation offers something similar, I’d love to hear how you’ve used your charity day.

08/09/2025

🌿 Medicinal Plants & the Future of Functional Foods 🌿

We were interested to see this recent post from IFST, highlighting new research in the International Journal of Food Science & Technology on the therapeutic potential of Costus pictus D., also known as the “Insulin plant.”

Diabetes and metabolic disorders remain a major global health challenge. This review explores how C. pictus could play a role in supporting better nutrition and health through its:
✔️ Antidiabetic, antioxidant & anti-inflammatory properties
✔️ Potential to modulate glucose metabolism & enhance insulin sensitivity
✔️ Applications in functional foods, from bakery to beverages

At IFIS Publishing, we are proud to support access to vital food science research that bridges traditional knowledge and modern innovation, helping build healthier and more sustainable food systems.

🔗 Read the full open-access review: https://bit.ly/47QaT19

05/09/2025

Discover how sea cucumbers could help protect against Type 2 diabetes. Research reveals their powerful antioxidant and antiglycation properties—opening doors to innovative functional foods and health benefits.
Find out more in our blog post: https://bit.ly/47P8pQj

04/09/2025

There is no definitive list of predatory journals, so it's important to be able to recognise and avoid predatory journals, whether you are literature searching or trying to publish your research.

Common characteristics include:
✔️ High acceptance rates
⌛ Fast turnaround times
💸 Hidden fees
⚠️ Poor or no peer review service
🤥 False claims about metrics, editorial board members, and more
🏢 Missing or bogus office location

Learn more about how to spot potentially predatory journals with our Predatory Journals Hub, full of advice and resources.

If in doubt, you can also try our Journal Lookup Service. It's a quick and easy tool for checking if a journal is indexed in FSTA. Every journal in FSTA has gone through our quality checks, so you can be confident it is peer-reviewed and not predatory:

https://bit.ly/4lYf5iu

03/09/2025

Covering a wide range of interdisciplinary content from journal articles and trade publications to conference proceedings and industry patents, FSTA is full of high-quality scientific abstracts and updated weekly. Here's a selection of what was included in FSTA during August 2025:

🔬17,925 new records

🌍 New records from 600 sources, including 157 publishers based in 49 countries

📖 2.3 million total records now available

Learn more about the newest additions, screened by the FSTA science team for quality, integrity and relevance: https://bit.ly/46b6h3c

02/09/2025

Shaping the Future of Food 🌱

We’re excited to share that Professor Anwesha Sarkar, IFIS Faculty Board Member and Professor of Colloids and Surfaces at the University of Leeds, will be speaking at Future Food-Tech London (24–25 September).

Anwesha’s pioneering research bridges food science, material science, and health – focusing on designing next-generation foods with improved nutrition, sustainability, and consumer appeal. Her insights will help drive the conversation on how we can reimagine food systems to meet global challenges.

This flagship event brings together 500+ global leaders from across the food-tech ecosystem – a unique platform to connect, exchange ideas, and inspire innovation.

👉 Learn more by following the link: https://lnkd.in/emEf3pwA

At IFIS Publishing, we’re proud to support thought leadership that advances knowledge and innovation in food science – and we’re thrilled to see Anwesha representing our community on such an influential stage.

27/08/2025

🚩Important insight on AI’s current limitations in research validation🚩
We came across an excellent post by Ruani highlighting new findings on ChatGPT’s ability to spot unreliable studies. The results? Eye-opening:

⚠0/217 retracted papers were flagged
⚠Some were even praised as “groundbreaking”
⚠False claims were endorsed as true two-thirds of the time

What does this mean:
AI can be a great tool for speed and synthesis — but it’s not yet a reliable fact-checker. Misinformation expressed with confidence is still misinformation. Until AI can truly evaluate sources and detect retractions, human oversight remains essential.

Read more on the study link in the comments:

26/08/2025

Why wait for cocoa to become scarce before inventing entirely new ways to make chocolate?

Cocoa prices are up 30–50% in two years. Trees are dying from disease, climate stress, and disappearing pollinators.

The industry’s response? Not panic. Lateral genius.
- Lindt is backing lab-grown cocoa cells. Chocolate from a bioreactor.
- Barry Callebaut is hedging with cultured cocoa collaborations.
- Mars is going full-CRISPR: tougher, disease-resistant beans.
- Mondelez is funding start-ups making cocoa butter from cell cultures.
- Nestlé is squeezing 30% more usable cocoa out of the fruit itself.
- Cargill is asking: who needs cocoa at all, when grape seeds and sunflowers can be made to taste like it?

This isn’t just supply-chain management. It’s marketing alchemy: redefining what counts as chocolate.

The real lesson? Innovation doesn’t arrive when things are comfortable. It arrives when your favourite treat is suddenly at risk of becoming a luxury item.

If you want to dig deeper than the headlines — into the science, the patents, the tech — the FSTA database is your golden ticket. For more information, take a look on the link below
https://bit.ly/4mz26Fd

And if you want to read more on this topic. Click below:
https://bit.ly/41koQQL

Chocolate makers are racing to secure the future of cocoa amid climate threats and disease outbreaks. From lab-grown cocoa and gene editing to cocoa-free alternatives, major players like Lindt, Barry Callebaut, Mars, Mondelēz, Cargill, and Nestlé are exploring innovative technologies to de-risk su...

20/08/2025

With predatory journals accounting for a staggering one fifth of global scientific output, it's more important than ever for food industry professionals, researchers and consumers to know how to identify and avoid this pseudoscience.

Exposure to articles, recordings and opinions that are presented as scientific but that are pseudoscience has the potential to influence awareness, knowledge and decision-making abilities - even putting people's health at risk.

Explore further with: How to avoid pseudoscience in food and nutrition research: https://bit.ly/4mLlJJR

18/08/2025

Something curious about M&M's, Skittles, and Starburst swapping artificial colours for natural ones by 2026—and why it’s exactly the sort of superficial change that speaks volumes.

Yes, Mars, the candy titan, is set to shift key products like M&M’s Chocolate, Skittles Original, and Starburst Original fruit chews from artificial dyes to naturally derived hues by 2026, in response to evolving consumer sentiment and mounting pressure.

But here's the real insight: this isn’t about the colour in your mouth—it’s about the colour in your mind.

We’re asked to believe it’s a substantive shift, yet Mars hasn’t committed to reformulating its entire portfolio—only select, iconic brands. Why? Because natural dyes are more finicky: they cost more, they fade faster, they might impact shelf life—and crucially, not everyone cares. In fact, Mars’s own research found that many consumers don’t see artificial colours as a problem at all.

So what’s going on here?

"Progress" packaged in palettes: This is marketing as perception management. By changing the splashiest visual cue—colour—Mars signals responsiveness without necessarily re-engineering the product itself.

The power of symbolic shifts: We live in an age where branding isn’t just about what we sell, it’s about what people think we stand for. Mars is delivering a signal: "We’re listening. We care." Yet underneath, the machinery stays mostly the same.

Consumer complexity: We’re not homogeneous. Some care deeply about “clean labels.” Others just want that perfect red Skittle, dye be damned. Mars, wisely nonsentimental, is hedging: offering choice, not mandates.

It's a little bit like changing from petrol to vegan leather on a sports car: it won’t affect performance for most, but it changes the story—and that story is everything.

In short, Mars is delivering a masterclass in behavioural economics. They're not promising a revolution—they’re offering a narrative change. And in marketing, narrative often matters more than the mechanics.

Mars’s move is subtle, self-aware, and undoubtedly sinuous. And while the candy might taste the same, the framing is the sweetest part of all.

Read more here - https://bit.ly/4fLgHe6

15/08/2025

Searching for scientific research can mean trawling through vast numbers of articles and other sources in order to locate the most relevant results. The best searches are ones that strike the right balance between being broad enough to ensure you don’t miss relevant research, but specific enough to avoid what is irrelevant.

The simplest way to start is to create the right search strategy, including the use of Boolean operators and other techniques. Making sure you start with the right search term is key to finding the right results, quickly and easily. Explore our popular Literature Searching Guide for advice on how to strike that balance.

https://bit.ly/47t1xbd