Traditional Food Safety Research Articles

Application of Convolutional Neural Networks and Recurrent Neural Networks in Food Safety

This review explores the application of convolutional neural networks (CNNs) and recurrent neural networks (RNNs) in food safety detection and risk prediction. This paper highlights the advantages of CNNs in image processing and feature recognition, as well as the powerful capabilities of RNNs (especially their variant LSTM) in time series data modeling. This paper also makes a comparative analysis in many aspects: Firstly, the advantages and disadvantages of traditional food safety detection and risk prediction methods are compared with deep learning technologies such as CNNs and RNNs. Secondly, the similarities and differences between CNNs and fully connected neural networks in processing image data are analyzed. Furthermore, the advantages and disadvantages of RNNs and traditional statistical modeling methods in processing time series data are discussed. Finally, the application directions of CNNs in food safety detection and RNNs in food safety risk prediction are compared. This paper also discusses combining these deep learning models with technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), blockchain, and federated learning to improve the accuracy and efficiency of food safety detection and risk warning. Finally, this paper mentions the limitations of RNNs and CNNs in the field of food safety, as well as the challenges in the interpretability of the model, and suggests the use of interpretable artificial intelligence (XAI) technology to improve the transparency of the model.

Lactococcus lactis subsp. lactis LJL7m20 strongly inhibits growth of the Bacillus cereus group from sufu

Sufu, a traditional fermented soybean curd, is prone to contamination by Bacillus cereus. In this study, 133 lactic acid bacteria (LAB) strains were initially screened from spring and winter Mao-tofu samples for their ability to inhibit the growth of B. cereus ATCC 14579T. Among these strains, five Lactococcus lactis strains exhibited a good safety profile and were capable of growing in pH 4–9 and salt concentrations of 6%–8%. Antimicrobial experiments conducted on the B. cereus group from sufu factories showed that L. lactis LJL7m20 strain had the strongest inhibitory effect. Whole-genome sequencing revealed the presence of three genes associated with high osmotic stress response and eight distinct two-component systems that may contribute to the strain's tolerance, enhancing its survival in high-salt environments. The strain was further identified as L. lactis subsp. lactis through a combination of phenotypic and genotypic analysis. Additionally, bacteriocins nisin Z and nisin A/Q were identified using the BAGEL4 and antiSMASH databases. ELISA further confirmed the strain's ability to produce nisin. A fermentation validation study demonstrated that inoculation with the strain contributed to reduce the number of B. cereus group in sufu pehtzes. This study provides a theoretical foundation for the use of new biocontrol bacteria to improve the safety of traditional fermented soybean foods.

Advancing food safety standards through technology integration and policy development

Food safety is a critical global concern, directly impacting public health, economic stability, and international trade. With the complexity of modern food supply chains and the rising incidence of foodborne illnesses, traditional food safety measures are often insufficient to address the growing risks. This review explores how integrating advanced technologies and developing robust policies can significantly enhance food safety standards. Technological innovations, including the Internet of Things (IoT), blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI), and automation, offer promising solutions for real-time monitoring, traceability, and predictive analytics in food production and distribution. IoT and sensors enable constant monitoring of environmental conditions like temperature and humidity, while blockchain ensures transparency and traceability across supply chains. AI and machine learning are transforming food safety by predicting contamination risks and optimizing inspection processes, while robotics and automation reduce human error in food processing plants. Alongside technological advancements, policy development plays a crucial role in reinforcing food safety standards. Global harmonization of food safety regulations, stronger enforcement mechanisms, and public-private partnerships are essential for ensuring widespread compliance. Incorporating technology into regulatory frameworks is key to addressing new challenges and maintaining food safety across borders. Governments must also prioritize consumer education and awareness through policies that leverage technology platforms to promote food safety knowledge. Case studies demonstrate the successful application of these technologies in sectors like dairy and meat processing, showcasing the potential for broader industry adoption. However, challenges such as high implementation costs, regulatory lag, and data security concerns remain. This review argues that a synergistic approach combining technological integration with forward-thinking policy development is essential for advancing global food safety standards and safeguarding public health in the future.

Robust Chemical Testing for Food Safety: Assessing and Identifying Dye Adulterants in Blueberry Juice: A Comprehensive Case Study with Statistical Measures and Correlation Analysis

In the food sector, the problem of food fraud—which encompasses the more focused category of adulteration driven by economic gain—is becoming more widely acknowledged and is raising concerns. Both the government and the industry are accountable for avoiding food adulteration, regardless of where the food danger originated. Food adulteration can result from incidents concerning food safety, food fraud, and food defence, which poses serious risks to the general public's health. In contrast to inadvertent injury in food safety events and intentional harm in food defence incidents, food fraud entails intentional activities for financial gain. Although financially motivated adulteration may have financial motivations, the unusual nature of contaminants frequently makes the related public health hazards more dangerous than traditional food safety threats. Establishing and executing a database that aggregates reports of food component fraud available for publicly accessible sources is an essential task. For governments, agencies, and individual enterprises assessing the possible dangers associated with certain items created in specific regions and those disseminated and sold elsewhere, this database provides essential information and useful data. The paper also describes current analytical tools for identifying food fraud and highlights new developments and trends in the food production industry and the food production bad sector.

3D Printing Technology: Role in Safeguarding Food Security.

The rising threats to food security include several factors, such as population growth, low agricultural investment, and poor distribution systems. Consequently, food insecurity results from a confluence of issues, including diseases, processing limitations, and distribution deficiencies. Food insecurity usually occurs in vulnerable areas where certain technologies and traditional food safety testing are not a viable solution for foodborne disease detection. In this regard, 3D printing technologies and 3D printed sensors open the platform to produce portable, accurate, and low-cost sensors that address the gaps and challenges in food security. In this paper, we discuss the perspective role of 3D printed sensors in food security in terms of food safety and food quality monitoring to provide reliable access to nutritious, affordable food. In each section, we highlight the advantages of 3D printing technology in terms of cost-effectiveness, accuracy, accessibility, and reproducibility compared to traditional manufacturing methodologies. Recent developments in robotic technologies for mechanization, such as food handling with soft grippers, are also discussed. Lastly, we delve into the applications of advanced 3D printing technologies in agricultural monitoring, particularly the future of plant wearables, environmental sensing, and overall plant health monitoring.

Human biomonitoring of dioxins, furans, and non-ortho dioxin-like polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in blood plasma from Old Crow, Yukon, Canada (2019)

Dioxins, furans, and dioxin-like polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are a group of persistent and toxic chemicals that are known to have human health effects at low levels. These chemicals have been produced for commercial use (PCBs) or unintentionally as by-products of industry or natural processes (PCBs, dioxins, and furans). Additionally, dioxin-like PCBs were formerly used in electrical applications before being banned internationally (2004). These chemicals are widely dispersed in the environment as they can contaminate air and travel hundreds to thousands of kilometers before depositing on land or water, thereafter, potentially entering food chains. Community concerns surrounding the safety of traditional foods prompted a human biomonitoring project in Old Crow, Yukon Territory (YT), Canada (2019). Through collaborative community engagement, dioxins and like compounds were identified as a priority for exposure assessment from biobanked samples.In 2022, biobanked plasma samples (n = 54) collected in Old Crow were used to measure exposures to seven dioxins, ten furans, and four dioxin-like PCBs. 1,2,3,6,7,8-HxCDD, 1,2,3,7,8,9-HxCDD, 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-HpCDD, OCDD, 2,3,4,7,8-PeCDF, 1,2,3,6,7,8-HxCDF, PCB 126, and PCB 169 were detected in at least 50 % of samples. Among these analytes, the only congener at elevated levels was PCB 169, which was approximately ∼2-fold higher than the general population of Canada. No significant sex-based or body mass index (BMI) differences in biomarker concentrations were observed. Generally, the concentrations of the detected congeners increased with age, except for 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-HpCDD.For the first time, this research measures dioxin and like-compound exposures in Old Crow, advancing the information available on chemical exposures in the Arctic. Further research could be directed towards the investigation of PCB 169 exposure sources and temporal monitoring of exposures and determinants.

Modernization of digital food safety control.

Foodborne illness remains a pressing global issue due to the complexities of modern food supply chains and the vast array of potential contaminants that can arise at every stage of food processing from farm to fork. Traditional food safety control systems are increasingly challenged to identify these intricate hazards. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) New Era of Smarter Food Safety represents a revolutionary shift in food safety methodology by leveraging cutting-edge digital technologies. Digital food safety control systems employ modern solutions to monitor food quality by efficiently detecting in real time a wide range of contaminants across diverse food matrices within a short timeframe. These systems also utilize digital tools for data analysis, providing highly predictive assessments of food safety risks. In addition, digital food safety systems can deliver a secure and reliable food supply chain with comprehensive traceability, safeguarding public health through innovative technological approaches. By utilizing new digital food safety methods, food safety authorities and businesses can establish an efficient regulatory framework that genuinely ensures food safety. These cutting-edge approaches, when applied throughout the food chain, enable the delivery of safe, contaminant-free food products to consumers.

Metagenomic Insights into the Microbiome and Resistance Genes of Traditional Fermented Foods in Arabia.

This study uncovered microbial communities and evaluated the microbiological safety of traditional fermented foods consumed in the Arab region. Samples of dairy and non-dairy fermented foods-mish, jibneh, zabadi, and pickles-were collected from local markets in Saudi Arabia. Using the MiSeq system, samples were sequenced using 16S amplicons and shotgun metagenomics. Alpha and beta diversity indicated inter- and intra-variation in the studied fermented foods' bacterial communities. In the case of mish, the replicates were clustered. Twenty-one genera were found to be significantly different (FDR < 0.05) in abundance in pairwise comparison of fermented foods. Five high-quality, metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) of Lactococcus lactis, Lactobacillus helveticus, Pseudoalteromonas nigrifaciens, Streptococcus thermophiles, and Lactobacillus acetotolerans were retrieved from the shotgun sequencing representing the dominant taxa in the studied fermented foods. Additionally, 33 genes that cause antimicrobial resistance (ARGs) against ten different antibiotic classes were detected. Metabolic pathways were abundant in the studied metagenomes, such as amino acid metabolism, carbohydrate metabolism, cofactors, and vitamin biosynthesis. Metagenomic evaluation of Arabian fermented foods, including the identification of probiotics, pathogenic bacteria, and ARGs, illustrates the importance of microbiological analysis in evaluating their health effects.

Synergistic Fermentation with Functional Microorganisms Improves Safety and Quality of Traditional Chinese Fermented Foods.

Traditional fermented foods are favored by people around the world for their positive health and taste advantages. Many of the fermented foods, including Chinese traditional fermented foods, are produced through mixed-culture fermentation. Apart from reducing the formation of harmful compounds such as ethyl carbamate (EC) and biogenic amines (BAs) during food fermentation, it is also difficult to precisely control and regulate the fermentation process based on the control of environmental conditions alone, due to the complex microbiota and an unclarified fermentation mechanism. In this review, key microorganisms involved in Chinese fermented foods such as baijiu, soy sauce, and vinegar production are elaborated, and relations between microbial composition and the aroma or quality of food are discussed. This review focuses on the interpretation of functions and roles of beneficial (functional) microorganisms that participate in food fermentation and the discussion of the possibilities of the synergistic use of functional microorganisms to improve the safety and quality of Chinese fermented foods. Conducting work toward the isolation of beneficial microorganisms is a challenge for modern food fermentation technology. Thus, methods for the isolation and mutagenesis of functional microbial strains for synergistic food fermentation are summarized. Finally, the limitations and future prospects of the use of functional microorganisms in traditional Chinese fermented foods are reviewed. This review provides an overview of the applications of synergistic fermentation with functional microorganisms in the improvement of the safety or sensory qualities of fermented foods.

Decolonising food regulatory frameworks: importance of recognising traditional culture when assessing dietary safety of traditional foods.

As interest in Australian native products continues to grow worldwide, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (First Peoples) are striving to be industry leaders in the production of their traditional foods that are being developed for commercial markets. To successfully gain market approval both within Australia and globally, food regulatory authorities require at least a documented history of safe use to indicate dietary safety. Moreover, many countries also require compositional analysis and safety data to further support their safe human consumption. However, safety data are lacking for many of these traditional food items and the history that surrounds their safe use has rarely been recorded in written form, but rather passed on through cultural practices and language. This review evaluates the suitability of current frameworks for assessing the dietary safety of traditional foods and highlights the food-safety regulatory hurdles currently felt by First Peoples and their businesses attempting to enter the Australian native foods industry. These issues also extend to the requirements of food regulatory authorities around the world, when assessing the market eligibility of traditional food items. Potential solutions to these problems are discussed, including new proposed processes that can be incorporated into the current food regulatory frameworks. Importantly, these proposed processes would allow the dietary risk assessment of traditional foods to be completed in a manner that better accommodates the stories, traditional knowledge and interests of First Peoples, while also meeting the safety data requirements set out by regulatory bodies both within Australia and around the world.

Nanomaterial-based biosensors for the detection of foodborne bacteria: a review.

Ensuring food safety is a critical concern for the development and well-being of humanity, as foodborne illnesses caused by foodborne bacteria have increasingly become a major public health concern worldwide. Traditional food safety monitoring systems are expensive and time-consuming, relying heavily on specialized equipment and operations. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop low-cost, user-friendly and highly sensitive biosensors for detecting foodborne bacteria. In recent years, the combination of nanomaterials with optical biosensors has provided a prospective future platform for the detection of foodborne bacteria. By harnessing the unique properties of nanomaterials, such as their high surface area-to-volume ratio and exceptional sensitivity, in tandem with the precision of optical biosensing techniques, a new prospect has opened up for the rapid and accurate identification of potential bacterial contaminants in food. This review focuses on recent advances and new trends of nanomaterial-based biosensors for the detection of foodborne pathogens, which mainly include noble metal nanoparticles (NMPs), metal organic frameworks (MOFs), graphene nanomaterials, quantum dot (QD) nanomaterials, upconversion fluorescent nanomaterials (UCNPs) and carbon dots (CDs). Additionally, we summarized the research progress of color indicators, nanozymes, natural enzyme vectors and fluorescent dye biosensors, focusing on the advantages and disadvantages of nanomaterial-based biosensors and their development prospects. This review provides an outlook on future technological directions and potential applications to help identify the most promising areas of development in this field.

Composition and function of viruses in sauce-flavor baijiu fermentation

Viruses are highly abundant in nature, associated with quality and safety of traditional fermented foods. However, the overall viral diversity and function are still poorly understood in food microbiome. Traditional baijiu fermentation is an ideal model system to examine the diversity and function of viruses owing to easy access, stable operation, and domesticated microbial community. Equipped with cutting-edge viral metagenomics, we investigated the viral community in the fermented grain and fermentation environment, as well as their contribution to baijiu fermentation. Viral communities in the fermented grains and fermentation environment are highly similar. The dominant viruses were bacteriophages, mainly including the order Caudovirales and the family Inoviridae. Furtherly, association network analysis showed that viruses and bacteria were significantly negatively correlated (P < 0.01). Viral diversity could significantly influence bacterial and fungal succession (P < 0.05). Moreover, we proved that starter phages could significantly inhibit the growth of Bacillus licheniformis in the logarithmic growth stage (P < 0.05) under culture condition. Based on the functional annotations, viruses and bacteria both showed high distribution of genes related to amino acid and carbohydrate metabolism. In addition, abundant auxiliary carbohydrate-active enzyme (CAZyme) genes were also identified in viruses, indicating that viruses were involved in the decomposition of complex polysaccharides during fermentation. Our results revealed that viruses could crucially affect microbial community and metabolism during traditional fermentation.

A review of traditional grain-based complementary foods for children aged 6-23 months in selected African countries

Background: Wheat and maize flour still represent the bulk ingredient in complementary foods. There is an increasing interest in traditional cereal grain-based products due to their positive health effects. The positive health benefits include; more protein and fiber content than modern grains and most are naturally gluten-free. Aims: To identify available traditional grain-based complementary food options used for children aged 6-23months in Africa, including the effects of various processing techniques on the nutritional value of the food products. Material and Methods: We searched SciELO, Google Scholar, AGORA, JSTOR, MedLine, ScienceDirect, SpringerLink, Wiley Online, and PubMed databases for the following (a) studies on the formulation of homemade or commercialized traditional grain-based complementary feeding porridges, (b) studies where traditional grains such as sorghum, finger millet, guinea millet, and pearl millet were used as the main ingredient. In addition, we evaluated the food processing techniques used, the resultant nutritional quality, and the acceptability of the product. Results: Thirteen eligible studies were identified. Traditional grains used frequently as complementary foods for children aged 6-23 months in Africa were pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum), millet (Panicum miliaceum), sorghum (Sorghum bicolor. L), and finger millet (Eleusine coracana). The most common techniques to improve the nutrition content of the foods were: fermentation, germination, and addition of legumes. Additionally, minor investigations have been carried out on effectiveness of these porridges in reducing malnutrition prevalence in this age group. Conclusions: In overall more studies are required with the focus on investigating the development of novel strategies to improve the nutritional profiles, safety, and acceptability of traditional grain-based complementary foods. Furthermore, their effectiveness to improve nutrition status of children needs to be investigated. Keywords: Complementary food, Infants, Traditional Grains, Africa.

Food safety concerns and food defense support: a cross-cultural study

Consumers face the risk that their food is unsafe because of natural and accidental contamination (traditional food safety problems) or deliberate contamination (food defense problems). Coordinated international efforts with leadership from developed countries could help reduce these food risks. If consumers within or between countries have different attitudes about the risks, it may be difficult to generate sufficient political support for building an international food safety system. A unique consumer survey of adults in the US, the UK, Spain, Italy, Germany, and Japan identified consumer attitudes about traditional food safety and food defense. Concerns about traditional food safety, confidence in the system to prevent intentional contamination, and funding allocations between food safety and food defense were examined in models with two sets of cultural control measures. Many people perceived food safety to be different from food defense. Food safety concerns were linked to gender, age, presence of children, education, income, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and masculinity. Food defense confidence was associated with gender, age, power distance, and uncertainty avoidance. Funding allocations were examined in two models and power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and individualism were significant. Although it was expected that low concerns about food safety and low confidence in food defense would increase the allocation share for food defense, this was not confirmed in the data. Many differences were noted between countries, showing the importance of culture for understanding attitudes toward food risks. Although both sets of cultural measures made significant contributions, neither was judged to be superior to country dummy variables. Given the variations found in attitudes toward food safety and food defense, creating an international solution to reduce food risks will be difficult.

Food Security and Safety in India

Abstract Let food be your medicine, instead of your medicine being your food. Hippocrates Food is indeed a way of distributing risks, causing sickness and death, and a means of sustaining and enjoying life. Infections caused by contaminated food are the most common transmissible medical problem in the globe. Food contamination has economic consequences at all levels of society. Disease caused by consuming contaminated food results in the need for care, whether it be institutionalized or self-care, on an individual and group level. Income is missed due to illness, which is extremely difficult on breadwinners. Foodborne disease is the most dangerous side effect, and it can even be fatal. It's also severe, with serious socioeconomic and psychological consequences. Despite an increase in the occurrence of foodborne illness, many public health officials fail to acknowledge the worldwide significance of foodborne illness. Changes that directly influence sanitation and the human environment, on the other hand, will pose a greater threat to food safety. Population ageing, urban sprawl and migration, and mass food production due to population growth and changing dietary patterns are all examples. Both traditional and modern food safety techniques should be improved and implemented properly. Legislative measures should be employed where necessary, but voluntary compliance and education of consumers and professional food handlers should be prioritised. This will be a major undertaking for primary care.

Assessing Safety of Market-Sold Fresh Fish: Tracking Fish Origins and Toxic Chemical Origins.

Increasing global and domestic food trade and required logistics create uncertainties in food safety inspection due to uncertainties in food origins and extensive trade activities. Modern blockchain techniques have been developed to inform consumers of food origins but do not provide food safety information in many cases. A novel food safety tracking and modeling framework for quantifying toxic chemical levels in the food and the food origins was developed. By integrating chemicals' multimedia environment exchange, food web, and source tracking systems, the framework was implemented to identify short-chain chlorinated paraffin (SCCP) contamination of fresh hairtail fish sold by a Walmart supermarket in Xi'an, northwestern China, and sourced in Eastern China Sea coastal waters. The framework was shown to successfully predict SCCP level with a mean of 17.8 ng g-1 in Walmart-sold hairtails, which was comparable to lab-analyzed 21.9 ng g-1 in Walmart-sold hairtails. The framework provides an alternative and cost-effective approach for safe food inspection compared to traditional food safety inspection techniques. These encouraging results suggest that the approach and rationale reported here could add additional information to the food origin tracking system to enhance transparency and consumers' confidence in the traded food they consumed.

Revisiting how the Javanese traditional food safety practice significantly reduces cyanide concentration of marketed cassava roots

Despite being one of the most popular staple foods in Indonesia, cassava roots contain cyanide that can cause death without proper processing. In traditional market, however, the variant of the roots, hence their exact cyanide concentration, is mostly unknown. Despite that, Javanese have successfully been curbing the cassava poisoning risk through generations. To revisit the role of the local food safety practice in reducing the cyanide concentration, this study investigated and simulated how Javanese in Malang Regency, East Java, Indonesia, traditionally prepare cassava roots for consumption. Two commonly marketed roots; white and yellow; were selected and cooked by steaming or roasting. The cyanide concentration of each stage was measured by picric acid method optimized for cassava roots. The analyses demonstrated that 30 min steaming peeled roots, as well as 50 min steaming and 30 min roasting the unpeeled roots reduced the cyanide content to 12-18 ppm, below the Indonesian acceptable limit of 40 ppm. The cooking duration and temperature of 100-230oC together contributed to decrease the cyanide concentration. Our findings concluded that Javanese applied traditional food safety management through the farmers’ preference to cultivate cassava with low cyanide level, the selection of fresh roots, and the cooking methods.

Strategies for Improving Traditional Food Safety “Urutan” Chicken through the Implementation of GMP and SSOP

&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; In the traditional “Urutan” chicken production process, the type and quality of raw materials and additional materials vary widely. In addition, other factors such as environmental conditions are difficult to control, and also the uncertain endpoint of the process involved, thus the application of basic feasibility needs to be done to improve the quality of the product. In this study, a model for the application of GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice) and (Sanitation Standard Operating Procedures) was developed for the production of 'Urutan' chicken. Analysis of the chemical, microbiological and organoleptic components was carried out based on the quality and food safety of meat sausage (SNI 3820-1-2015). According to analysis results, it was revealed that the implementation of GMP and SSOP was poorly implemented. This was proven from the results of the analysis of the product from producers number 6 and 8 that did not meet the requirements of Total Plate Count (TPC) meat sausage (SNI 3820-1-2015) because it exceeded the requirements of 1 x 105 which from the test results obtained 2.5 x 106 colonies/ g and 5.5 x 106 colonies/g. That indicated that sanitation and hygiene were inadequate. Meanwhile, the organoleptic assessment of color resulted (slightly like - very like), texture (rather dislike - extremely like), aroma (rather dislike - like), taste (neutral – extremely like), and overall acceptance (neutral to very like).&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D;

Assessing the safety of bioactive ingredients in infant formula that affect the immune system: recommendations from an expert panel

Bioactive ingredients for infant formula have been sought to reduce disparities in health outcomes between breastfed and formula-fed infants. Traditional food safety methodologies have limited ability to assess some bioactive ingredients. It is difficult to assess the effects of nutrition on the infant immune system because of coincident developmental adaptations to birth, establishment of the microbiome and introduction to solid foods, and perinatal environmental factors. An expert panel was convened to review information on immune system development published since the 2004 Institute of Medicine report on evaluating the safety of new infant formula ingredients and to recommend measurements that demonstrate the safety of bioactive ingredients intended for that use. Panel members participated in a 2-d virtual symposium in November 2020 and in follow-up discussions throughout early 2021. Key topics included identification of immune system endpoints from nutritional intervention studies, effects of human milk feeding and human milk substances on infant health outcomes, ontologic development of the infant immune system, and microbial influences on tolerance. The panel explored how "nonnormal" conditions such as preterm birth, allergy, and genetic disorders could help define developmental immune markers for healthy term infants. With consideration of breastfed infants as a reference, ensuring proper control groups, and attention to numerous potential confounders, the panel recommended a set of standard clinical endpoints including growth, response to vaccination, infection and other adverse effects related to inflammation, and allergy and atopic diseases. It compiled a set of candidate markers to characterize stereotypical patterns of immune system development during infancy, but absence of reference ranges, variability in methods and populations, and unreliability of individual markers to predict disease prevented the panel from including many markers as safety endpoints. The panel's findings and recommendations are applicable for industry, regulatory, and academic settings, and will inform safety assessments for immunomodulatory ingredients in foods besides infant formula.

Eaters, Powerless by Design

Food law, including traditional food safety regulation, antihunger programs, and food system worker protections, has received increased attention in recent years as a distinct field of study. Bringing together these disparate areas of law under a single lens provides an opportunity to understand the role of law in shaping what we eat (what food is produced and where it is distributed), how much we eat, and how we think about food. The food system is rife with problems— endemic hunger, worker exploitation, massive environmental externalities, and diet-related disease. Looked at in a piecemeal fashion, elements of food law appear responsive to these problems. Looked at as a whole, however, food law appears instead to entrench the existing structures of power that generate these problems. This Article offers a novel conceptual critique of the food system. It argues that food law is built on two contradictory myths: the myth of the helpless consumer who needs government protections from food producers and the myth of the responsible consumer who needs no government protection and can take on the food system’s many problems herself. The first myth is self-actualizing, as the laws that it justifies disempower food consumers and producers. The second myth is self-defeating, as the legal structures that assume consumer responsibility impede meaningful consumer choice. Food law, as it is shaped by these myths, constructs powerlessness by homogenizing— or erasing diversity within—the food system, paralyzing consumers through information control, and polarizing various food system constituents who might otherwise collaborate on reform. Ultimately, food law is designed to thwart food sovereignty. By revealing how the structures of food law itself obstruct reform, this Article also identifies a path forward toward true food sovereignty.