News
16th June 2012
Queen’s Birthday Honour for IFR scientist
Professor Vic Morris from the Institute of Food Research has been awarded an MBE for services to food science in the 2012 Queen’s Birthday Honours list. Vic has worked for the last 32 years at IFR studying food structure. Vic’s group has developed and...
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1st June 2012
Why is it so difficult to trace the origins of food poisoning outbreaks?
As illustrated by the E. coli outbreak in Germany in 2011, any delay in identifying the source of food poisoning outbreaks can cost lives and cause considerable political and economical damage. An international multidisciplinary team of scientists have shown that difficulties in finding the...
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24th May 2012
£29 million investment in research and innovation at the Institute of Food Research
New research on the physical and chemical nature of food and its impact on health will help drive innovation in the UK and worldwide. The research will make it possible for new healthy and safer food products to be developed, reducing the...
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23rd May 2012
IFR Research Scientist and STEM Ambassador, Mark Fernandes, describes his day spent making Yoghurt and explaining Science to over 200 Cub Scouts at the Norfolk Showground. On Saturday the 5th of May, I and three other STEM Ambassadors, Jill from the Space Conference venue,...
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22nd May 2012
The foodborne bacterium Campylobacter requires selenium for respiration of organic acids
Researchers at the Institute of Food Research have discovered why the micronutrient selenium is important to the survival of Campylobacter bacteria, which are responsible for an estimated half a million cases of food poisoning annually in the UK alone. Knowing how and why Campylobacter...
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9th May 2012
Epigenetics, folates and the human gut
IFR is exploring epigenetic changes in cells that line the human gut, which are linked to our vulnerability to developing cancer. Here, Professor Ian Johnson comments on DNA methylation, and on a new study from Nigel Belshaw’s group which suggests that prolonged exposure to...
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24th April 2012
IFR in the City Lecture ‘Food for a leaner future’
During National Science and Engineering Week, Dr Susan Jebb, Head of Diet and Population Health at the Medical Research Council Human Nutrition Research Unit (HNR) gave the annual IFR in the City Lecture. Her talk, ‘Food for a leaner future’ touched on the science underpinning...
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19th April 2012
UK-Vietnam Workshop on Biofuels
Professor Keith Waldron has attended a UK-Vietnam Workshop on Biofuels, sponsored by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and the British Embassy. Vietnam is a centre of rice growing and production, and the waste rice straw from this could represent a significant...
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18th April 2012
Conference poster prize for Toxoplasma gondii work
PhD student Caroline Weight recently won a prize for a poster that she presented at an international conference on aspects of tight junctions, which are specialised connections between adjacent epithelial cells. Her poster outlined some of the major findings from her PhD on how...
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4th April 2012
Exposure to stomach acid primes Campylobacter for intestinal infection
Campylobacter is a major cause of foodborne gastroenteritis, with an estimated 500,000 infections annually in the UK. The most common infection route is on undercooked poultry meat, and then crossing the lining of the small intestine. To do this, the bacteria must survive the...
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