Food inauthenticity: Authority activities, guidance for food operators, and mitigation tools.

Historically, food fraud was a major public health concern which helped drive the development of early food regulations in many markets including the US and EU market. In the past 10 years, the integrity of food chains with respect to food fraud has again been questioned due to high profile food fraud cases. We provide an overview of the resulting numerous authoritative activities underway within different regions to counter food fraud, and we describe the guidance available to the industry to understand how to assess the vulnerability of their businesses and implement appropriate mitigation. We describe how such controls should be an extension of those already in place to manage wider aspects of food authenticity, and we provide an overview of relevant analytical tools available to food operators and authorities to protect supply chains. Practical Application: Practical Application of the provided information by the food industry in selecting resources (guidance document, analytical methods etc.).

Furan and Methylfurans in Foods: An Update on Occurrence, Mitigation, and Risk Assessment.

The acceptance of many foods is related to traditional cooking practices, which create taste and texture and are important to digestibility, preservation, and the reduction of foodborne illnesses. A wide range of compounds are formed during the cooking of foods, a number of these have been shown to lead to adverse effects in classical toxicological models and are known as food processing contaminants (FPC). It is essential that the presence and effects of such compounds alone and in combination within the diet are understood such that proportionate risk management measures can be developed, while taking a holistic view across the whole value chain. Furan and alkylfurans (principally 2- and 3-methylfuran) are highly volatile FPC, which are formed in a wide range of foods at low amounts. The focus of research to-date has been on those foods, which have been identified to be most consequential in terms of being sources of exposure, namely jarred and canned foods for infants and young children (meals and drinks) and coffee (roast and ground, soluble). This report presents (i) new industry data on the occurrence of furan and methylfurans in selected food categories following previous coffee studies, (ii) the most salient parameters that impact furan formation, and (iii) aspects of importance for the risk assessment.

Measurement of nanomaterials in foods: integrative consideration of challenges and future prospects.

The risks and benefits of nanomaterials in foods and food contact materials receive conflicting international attention across expert stakeholder groups as well as in news media coverage and published research. Current nanomaterial characterization is complicated by the lack of accepted approaches to measure exposure-relevant occurrences of suspected nanomaterials in food and by broad definitions related to food processing and additive materials. Therefore, to improve understanding of risk and benefit, analytical methods are needed to identify what materials, new or traditional, are "nanorelevant" with respect to biological interaction and/or uptake during alimentary tract transit. Challenges to method development in this arena include heterogeneity in nanomaterial composition and morphology, food matrix complexity, alimentary tract diversity, and analytical method limitations. Clear problem formulation is required to overcome these and other challenges and to improve understanding of biological fate in facilitating the assessment of nanomaterial safety or benefit, including sampling strategies relevant to food production/consumption and alimentary tract transit. In this Perspective, we discuss critical knowledge gaps that must be addressed so that measurement methods can better inform risk management and public policy.

Engineered Nanoscale Food Ingredients: Evaluation of Current Knowledge on Material Characteristics Relevant to Uptake from the Gastrointestinal Tract.

The NanoRelease Food Additive project developed a catalog to identify potential engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) used as ingredients, using various food-related databases. To avoid ongoing debate on defining the term nanomaterial, NanoRelease did not use any specific definition other than the ingredient is not naturally part of the food chain, and its dimensions are measured in the nanoscale. Potential nanomaterials were categorized based on physical similarity; analysis indicated that the range of ENMs declared as being in the food chain was limited. Much of the catalog's information was obtained from product labeling, likely resulting in both underreporting (inconsistent or absent requirements for labeling) and/or overreporting (inability to validate entries, or the term nano was used, although no ENM material was present). Three categories of ingredients were identified: emulsions, dispersions, and their water-soluble powdered preparations (including lipid-based structures); solid encapsulates (solid structures containing an active material); and metallic or other inorganic particles. Although much is known regarding the physical/chemical properties for these ingredient categories, it is critical to understand whether these properties undergo changes following their interaction with food matrices during preparation and storage. It is also important to determine whether free ENMs are likely to be present within the gastrointestinal tract and whether uptake of ENMs may occur in their nanoform physical state. A practical decision-making scheme was developed to help manage testing requirements.

Approaches to the safety assessment of engineered nanomaterials (ENM) in food.

A systematic, tiered approach to assess the safety of engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) in foods is presented. The ENM is first compared to its non-nano form counterpart to determine if ENM-specific assessment is required. Of highest concern from a toxicological perspective are ENMs which have potential for systemic translocation, are insoluble or only partially soluble over time or are particulate and bio-persistent. Where ENM-specific assessment is triggered, Tier 1 screening considers the potential for translocation across biological barriers, cytotoxicity, generation of reactive oxygen species, inflammatory response, genotoxicity and general toxicity. In silico and in vitro studies, together with a sub-acute repeat-dose rodent study, could be considered for this phase. Tier 2 hazard characterisation is based on a sentinel 90-day rodent study with an extended range of endpoints, additional parameters being investigated case-by-case. Physicochemical characterisation should be performed in a range of food and biological matrices. A default assumption of 100% bioavailability of the ENM provides a 'worst case' exposure scenario, which could be refined as additional data become available. The safety testing strategy is considered applicable to variations in ENM size within the nanoscale and to new generations of ENM.