Food Chemistry and Food Microbiology

Mass Spectrometry in Food Technology and Nutrigenomics

Mass spectrometry is a powerful tool to analyses small molecules with even an isotope difference and extensively used in food biotechnology, food engineering, and toxicology. Mass spectrometry works by ionizing chemical compounds to generate charged molecules or molecule fragments and measuring their mass-to-charge ratios. Nutrigenomics is the study of effects of nutrition, nourishment or lack of nutrition on the genetic expression and anatomical or physiological changes of a living entity. Nutrigenomics has also been described by the influence of genetic variation on nutrition, by correlating gene expression or SNPs with a nutrient's absorption, metabolism, elimination or biological effects.