research topics for food safety

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New Era of Smarter Food Safety

Virtual Public Meeting on Data and Technology in the New Era of Smarter Food Safety

Collaborating on Culture in the New Era of Smarter Food Safety (Webinar Series)

Tech-Enabled Traceability Video Series

Welcome to the New Era of Smarter Food Safety

FDA is taking a new approach to food safety, leveraging technology and other tools and approaches to create a safer and more digital, traceable food system.

Blueprint 

The New Era of Smarter Food Safety blueprint , announced in July 2020, outlines achievable goals to enhance traceability, improve predictive analytics, respond more rapidly to outbreaks, address new business models, reduce contamination of food, and foster the development of stronger food safety cultures. 

In FDA Voices , Frank Yiannas, Deputy Commissioner for Food Policy and Response, recognized some of the significant accomplishments achieved by FDA's Foods Program in 2021.

FDA, working with partners in the public and private sectors, has continued to advance goals in each of the four priority areas, called core elements.

Tech-enabled Traceability

Smarter Tools and Approaches for Prevention and Outbreak Response

New Business Models and Retail Modernization

Food Safety Culture

What's New 

Activities on the New Era of Smarter Food Safety Blueprint  

View a list of accomplishments, events, announcements, and other select activities helping achieve the ultimate goal to bend the curve of foodborne illness in this country by reducing the number of illnesses.

Questions? 

Visit our  Frequently Asked Questions   page to learn more. 

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Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA)

The New Era of Smarter Food Safety builds on work that FDA has done to implement FSMA, which established science and risk-based protections.

Outbreaks of Foodborne Illness

Enhanced traceability and predictive analytics are New Era goals to speed outbreak response and prevention.

If you would like more information about the New Era of Smarter Food Safety, or have relevant information that you would like to share, contact us in the following ways:

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Core Article Databases

These databases are a good starting point for most Food Safety / Food Security topics

• AgEcon Search: Research in Agricultural and Applied Economics Free, open access repository of scholarly materials, working papers, and government documents covering agribusiness, food supply, environmental economics, policy issues, economic development, and other areas of agricultural economics.
• AgNic: Agricultural Network Information Center Searchable on-line guide to quality agricultural information via the Internet. Resources are selected and produced by the National Agricultural Library, land-grant universities and partners in the public sector.
• Agricola (open to everyone) Public access through the National Agricultural Library.
• AGRICOLA (United States National Agricultural Library) Includes research journals, USDA publications, FAO publications, conference proceedings, and books. Covers agricultural economics, agricultural engineering, agricultural products, animal industries, animal nutrition, botany, plant science, soil science, and environmental impact.
• Agricultural & Environmental Science Database Focused research tool for cross-disciplinary agriculture and environmental sciences research. Discover journals, trade publications, and conference proceedings. Featuring Agricola Index.
• Agris (FAO Agriculture-United Nations) -(Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations), (1986-) citations/some abstracts- Topic coverage includes agricultural economics, agriculture, animal production, aquatic science and fisheries, machinery and buildings, natural resources, plant production, pollution, and rural sociology.
• Biological Abstracts Large article database covering all aspects of biology including bacteriology, cell biology, genetics, microbiology, pathology, physiology, toxicology, virology, zoology, and more. ISI Thomson Scientific
• CABI CAB Abstracts (Agriculture & Veterinary) Leading scholarly database covering agriculture and natural resources worldwide.
• CINAHL Plus (Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature) CINAHL Plus with Full Text provides indexing for 3,024 journals from the fields of nursing and allied health; includes the areas of food and nutrition in human health and well-being.
• EconLit Indexes and abstracts more than 300 scholarly periodicals and books in the field of economics.
• FSTA - Food Science & Technology Abstracts Search scholarly materials, standards, legislation, and patents covering beverages, cocoa and chocolate, commodity technology, dairy products, dietetic foods, fats and oils, fermentation technology, fish, flour and bakery products, food additives and engineering, food hygiene, food laws, meat and poultry, sugars, and toxicology.
• PubMed Developed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM), provides free access to thousands of scholarly articles in the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, pharmacy, health care systems, and more.
• Sociological Abstracts Indexes and abstracts 2,000 worldwide journals in sociology, as well as dissertations and websites. Includes Social Planning Policy and Development Abstracts.
• Web of Science A collection of databases that index the world’s leading scholarly literature across the sciences.

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• Last Updated: Jul 29, 2024 4:59 PM
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Food Safety - Science topic

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Food safety

• Food safety, nutrition and food security are inextricably linked.
• An estimated 600 million – almost 1 in 10 people in the world – fall ill after eating contaminated food and 420 000 die every year, resulting in the loss of 33 million healthy life years (DALYs).
• US$ 110 billion is lost each year in productivity and medical expenses resulting from unsafe food in low- and middle-income countries.
• Children under 5 years of age carry 40% of the foodborne disease burden, with 125 000 deaths every year.
• Foodborne diseases impede socioeconomic development by straining health care systems and harming national economies, tourism and trade.

Access to sufficient amounts of safe and nutritious food is key to sustaining life and promoting good health. Unsafe food containing harmful bacteria, viruses, parasites or chemical substances causes more than 200 diseases, ranging from diarrhoea to cancers. It also creates a vicious cycle of disease and malnutrition, particularly affecting infants, young children, elderly and the sick. Good collaboration between governments, producers and consumers is needed to help ensure food safety and stronger food systems.

Major foodborne illnesses and causes

Foodborne illnesses are usually infectious or toxic in nature and caused by bacteria, viruses, parasites or chemical substances entering the body through contaminated food. Chemical contamination can lead to acute poisoning or long-term diseases, such as cancer. Many foodborne diseases may lead to long-lasting disability and death. Some examples of food hazards are listed below.

• Salmonella, Campylobacter and enterohaemorrhagic Escherichia coli are some of the most common foodborne pathogens that affect millions of people annually, sometimes with severe and fatal outcomes. Symptoms can be fever, headache, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain and diarrhoea. Foods involved in outbreaks of salmonellosis include eggs, poultry and other products of animal origin. Foodborne cases with Campylobacter are mainly caused by raw milk, raw or undercooked poultry and drinking water. Enterohaemorrhagic Escherichia coli is associated with unpasteurized milk, undercooked meat and contaminated fresh fruits and vegetables.
• Listeria infections can lead to miscarriage in pregnant women or death of newborn babies. Although disease occurrence is relatively low, Listeria ’s severe and sometimes fatal health consequences, particularly among infants, children and the elderly, count them among the most serious foodborne infections. Listeria is found in unpasteurised dairy products and various ready-to-eat foods and can grow at refrigeration temperatures.
• Vibrio cholerae can infect people through contaminated water or food. Symptoms may include abdominal pain, vomiting and profuse watery diarrhoea, which quickly lead to severe dehydration and possibly death. Rice, vegetables, millet gruel and various types of seafood have been implicated in cholera outbreaks.

Antimicrobials, such as antibiotics, are essential to treat infections caused by bacteria, including foodborne pathogens. However, their overuse and misuse in veterinary and human medicine has been linked to the emergence and spread of resistant bacteria, rendering the treatment of infectious diseases ineffective in animals and humans.

Some viruses can be transmitted by food consumption. Norovirus is a common cause of foodborne infections that is characterized by nausea, explosive vomiting, watery diarrhoea and abdominal pain. Hepatitis A virus can also be transmitted by food and can cause long-lasting liver disease and spreads typically through raw or undercooked seafood or contaminated raw produce.

Some parasites, such as fish-borne trematodes, are only transmitted through food. Others, for example tapeworms like Echinococcus spp, or Taenia spp, may infect people through food or direct contact with animals. Other parasites, such as Ascaris, Cryptosporidium, Entamoeba histolytica or Giardia , enter the food chain via water or soil and can contaminate fresh produce.

Prions, infectious agents composed of protein, are unique in that they are associated with specific forms of neurodegenerative disease. Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE, or so-called mad cow disease) is a prion disease in cattle, associated with the variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) in humans. Consuming meat products containing specified risk material, such as brain tissue, is the most likely route of transmission of the prion agent to humans.

Of most concern for health are naturally occurring toxins and environmental pollutants.

• Naturally occurring toxins include mycotoxins, marine biotoxins, cyanogenic glycosides and toxins occurring in poisonous mushrooms. Staple foods like corn or cereals can contain high levels of mycotoxins, such as aflatoxin and ochratoxin, produced by mould on grain. A long-term exposure can affect the immune system and normal development, or cause cancer.
• Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) are compounds that accumulate in the environment and human body. Known examples are dioxins and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), which are unwanted by-products of industrial processes and waste incineration. They are found worldwide in the environment and accumulate in animal food chains. Dioxins are highly toxic and can cause reproductive and developmental problems, damage the immune system, interfere with hormones and cause cancer.
• Heavy metals  such as lead, cadmium and mercury cause neurological and kidney damage. Contamination by heavy metal in food occurs mainly through pollution of water and soil.
• Other chemical hazards in food can include radioactive nucleotides that can be discharged into the environment from industries and from civil or military nuclear operations, food allergens, residues of drugs and other contaminants incorporated in the food during the process.

The burden of foodborne diseases

The burden of foodborne diseases to public health and to economies has often been underestimated due to underreporting and difficulty to establish causal relationships between food contamination and resulting illness or death.

The 2015 WHO report on the estimates of the global burden of foodborne diseases presented the first-ever estimates of disease burden caused by 31 foodborne agents (bacteria, viruses, parasites, toxins and chemicals) at global and sub-regional level, highlighting that more than 600 million cases of foodborne illnesses and 420 000 deaths could occur in a year. The burden of foodborne diseases falls disproportionately on groups in vulnerable situations and especially on children under 5, with the highest burden in low- and middle-income countries.

The 2019 World Bank report on the economic burden of the foodborne diseases indicated that the total productivity loss associated with foodborne disease in low- and middle-income countries was estimated at US$ 95.2 billion per year, and the annual cost of treating foodborne illnesses is estimated at US$ 15 billion.

The evolving world and food safety

Safe food supplies support national economies, trade and tourism, contribute to food and nutrition security, and underpin sustainable development.

Urbanization and changes in consumer habits have increased the number of people buying and eating food prepared in public places. Globalization has triggered growing consumer demand for a wider variety of foods, resulting in an increasingly complex and longer global food chain. Climate change is also predicted to impact food safety.

These challenges put greater responsibility on food producers and handlers to ensure food safety. Local incidents can quickly evolve into international emergencies due to the speed and range of product distribution.

A public health priority

Governments should make food safety a public health priority, as they play a pivotal role in developing policies and regulatory frameworks and establishing and implementing effective food safety systems. Food handlers and consumers need to understand how to safely handle food and practicing the WHO Five keys to safer food at home, or when selling at restaurants or at local markets. Food producers can safely grow fruits and vegetables using the WHO Five keys to growing safer fruits and vegetables .

WHO response

WHO aims to strengthen national food control systems to facilitate global prevention, detection and response to public health threats associated with unsafe food. To do this, WHO supports Member States by:

• providing independent scientific assessments on microbiological and chemical hazards that form the basis for international food standards, guidelines, and recommendations, known as the Codex Alimentarius ;
• assessing the performance of national food control systems throughout the entire food chain, identifying priority areas for further development, and measuring and evaluating progress over time through the FAO/WHO food control system assessment tool ;  
• assessing the safety of new technologies used in food production, such as genetic modification, cultivated food products and nanotechnology;
• helping implement adequate infrastructure to manage food safety risks and respond to food safety emergencies through the International Food Safety Authorities Network ( INFOSAN );
• promoting safe food handling through systematic disease prevention and awareness programmes, through the WHO Five keys to safer food message and training materials;
• advocating for food safety as an important component of health security and for integrating food safety into national policies and programmes in line with the International Health Regulations (IHR 2005);
• monitoring regularly the global burden of foodborne and zoonotic diseases at national, regional and international levels, and supporting countries to estimate the national burden of foodborne diseases; and
• updating the WHO Global Strategy for Food Safety (2022–2030) to support Member States to strengthen their national food control systems and reduce the burden of foodborne diseases.

WHO works closely with Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), The UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and other international organizations to ensure food safety along the entire food chain from production to consumption.

• Safe, healthy and sustainable diets
• Food handlers manual
• Nuclear accidents and radioactive contamination of foods
• WHO estimates of the global burden of foodborne diseases
• Advancing food safety initiatives: strategic plan for food safety including foodborne zoonoses 2013-2022
• WHO's work on food safety
• Codex Alimentarius – International Food Standards

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The United States food regulatory system has developed piecemeal over the last century, generating new rules and regulations in response to emerging food problems. As a result, an organizational structure allocates to various government agencies differing responsibilities for specific food safety concerns. A key to effective regulation within this complex and fragmented system is interagency cooperation, cooperation between these agencies, and public and private stakeholders. Although this overview focuses on federal regulation of food safety, it is important to note that state regulatory agencies also play an important role in food safety regulation, especially in enforcement. Most notably, state regulatory agencies are primarily responsible for food sanitation and safe food handling by food retailers, food service providers, and food vending operations.  Read the full overview .

Note : Recently added resources are posted at the top of the applicable sections .

Major Statutes

Egg Products Inspection Act  (EPIA) Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act  (FDCA) Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act  (FIFRA) Federal Meat Inspection Act  (FMIA) Food Safety Modernization Act of 2011 (FSMA) Poultry Products Inspection Act  (PPIA) Swine Health Protection Act (SHPA)

Regulations

Poultry and Egg Products Regulations,  7 C.F.R. Part 94 Mandatory Meat and Poultry Products Inspection Regulations,  9 C.F.R. Parts 300-381 Regulatory Requirements Under FMIA/PPIA/EPIA , 9 C.F.R. Parts 412-500 Egg Products Inspection Regulations,  9 C.F.R. Parts 590-592 General Regulations for the Enforcement of the FDCA,  21 C.F.R. Parts 1-99 FDA’s Food for Human Consumption Regulations , 21 C.F.R. Parts 100-199 Animal Drugs, Feeds, and Related Products Regulations , 21 C.F.R. Parts 500-599 Tolerances and Exemptions for Pesticide Chemical Residues in Food ,  40 C.F.R. Part 180 Processed Fishery Products Regulations , 50 C.F.R. Parts 260-261

Case Law Index for Food Safety

Administrative Law Decisions

FDA Dockets Management USDA Office of the Administrative Law Judges USDA Office of the Judicial Officer

Center Research Publications

Produce Safety Rule Highlights  (Copper & Caracciolo, 2021) Meat Processing Laws in the United States  (E. Rumley & Wilkerson, 2020) Issue Brief: Organization for Competitive Markets Seeks Judicial Review of USDA’s GIPSA Rule Withdrawal (Lizano & E. Rumley, 2018) Recent Legal Developments with the Food Safety Modernization Act  (Schweichler, 2018) Cottage Food Laws: Adequately Addressing Food Safety and Economic Opportunity?  (Adams & Hall, 2018) “Cottage Food” Laws (Hall) FSMA Animal Food Rule – Current Good Manufacturing Practice, Hazard Analysis, and Risk-Based Preventive Control  (Dillard, 2016) Cattle Traceability: Potential Legal Implications  (Rumley & Dowell) State-Specific Direct Marketing Business Guides  (National Ag Law Center & U. IL @Urbana) 3rd Party Food Safety Audits of Specialty Crop Operations  (Seideman & Rainey, 2012) Food Safety and Specialty Crops  (R. Rumley) Legal and Business Guide for Specialty Crop Producers (National Ag Law Center & U. AR Division of Agriculture, 2011; updated 2022)

Congressional Research Service Reports

Reports – published and made available by CRS beginning in 2017 Subjects – published by CRS and made available by NALC:

Food Safety Animal Agriculture Produce Safety: Requirements, Implementation, and Issues for Congress (R46706 2021) Proposed Reorganization of U.S. Federal Food Safety Agencies (IF10974 2018)

Agricultural Law Bibliography

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Legal publications on Food Safety:

Food and Drug Law Fruits and Vegetables – Perishable Agricultural Commodities Pesticides, Herbicides, Insecticides, Fungicides, Fertilizers Torts, Insurance

Reference Resources

Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service

What Swine Growers Need to Know about Garbage Feeding

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention  (CDC)

A-Z Index for Foodborne Illness Division of Foodborne, Waterborne, and Environmental Diseases (DFWED) Educational Materials Food Safety Office Food Safety Information for Specific Groups

Department of Justice (DOJ)

Keeping our Food Safe

Economic Research Service  (ERS)

Policy Topics: Food Safety Policy Topics: Food Choices & Health

Environmental Protection Agency  (EPA)

Pesticides Food Quality Protection Act Food and Pesticides

Food and Drug Administration  (FDA)

Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN) FDA Food Code FDA Office of Criminal Investigations FDA Warning Letters FSMA Final Rule for Preventive Controls for Human Food Recalls, Market Withdrawals, & Safety Alerts Retail Food Risk Factor Study State Retail and Food Service Codes and Regulations by State FoodSafety.gov: Gateway to Food Safety Information

Food Safety and Inspection Service  (FSIS)

Food Safety Guidelines Database Guidelines for the Transportation and Distribution of Meat, Poultry, and Processed Egg Products Food Safety Agencies & Partners Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) Guide “At Least Equal To” Guidelines for State Meat and Poultry Cooperative Inspection Programs Meat and Poultry Hazards and Controls Guide Mobile Slaughter Unit Compliance Guide Recalls and Public Health Alerts Food Safety Policy Regulatory Enforcement U.S. Codex Office

National Agricultural Library  (NAL)

Food Safety Research Information Office Database

Congressional Resources

U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, & Forestry U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Agriculture U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Reports on Food Safety (Government Accountability Office)

Other Federal Resources

Antibiotic Use in Food Animals: FDA’s Current Activities  (CRS In Focus Summary) National Programs: Food Safety  (Agricultural Research Service) Global Beef Trade: Effects of Animal Health, Sanitary, Food Safety, and Other Measures on U.S. Beef Exports  (U.S. International Trade Commission)

Publications

Government Repudiation of Americans’ Safety: A Call for Reformation of FDA’s GRAS Notification Program (Soroudi, 2020) The Park Doctrine and Prosecution of Misdemeanor Violations under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (Or….Farmer Bill Goes to Jail  (Gurwitz, 2016) Responding to a Client’s Food Safety Issue  (Handel, 2017) The Food Modernization Act What Every Texas Lawyer Should Know  (Walsh, 2017) Food Safety Modernization Act: Inspections, Compliance Strategies and Opportunities for Comment  (Practical Winery & Vineyard)

Additional Resources

Consumer Brands Association Food and Drug Law Institute Food Fix Food Safety  (IA St. U. Ext.) Food Safety Posts (NALC’s Ag & Food Law Blog) Food Safety Resource Center  (Organic Consumers Association) Food Safety Risk Analysis Clearinghouse  (Joint Institute for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, U. MD) Institute of Food Technologists Raw Milk Facts State by State

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• Human Nutrition and Food Safety

Research Publications (Food Safety)

This page tracks research articles published in national and international peer-reviewed journals. Recent articles are available ahead of print and searchable by Journal, Article Title, and Category. Research publications are tracked across six categories: Bacterial Pathogens, Chemical Contaminants, Natural Toxins, Parasites, Produce Safety, and Viruses. Articles produced by USDA Grant Funding Agencies (requires login) and FDA Grant Funding Agencies (requires login) are also tracked in Scopus.

Displaying 1 - 25 of 42127

Sanitizer resistance and persistence of listeria monocytogenes isolates in tree fruit packing facilities.

• Sun, 09/01/2024 - 04:00
• Journal of Food Protection
• Bacterial pathogens
• Listeria monocytogenes

Effects of film-forming components on the viability of probiotics and the application of synbiotic pectin film in preserving Da Xanh pomelo and Thai jackfruit fresh-cut

• Food Science and Biotechnology

Minimally processed products are highly convenient, and fresh-cut fruits coated with the synbiotic film have many advantages. This study investigated the film-forming components and preservation ability of Da Xanh pomelo and Thai jackfruit fresh-cut by synbiotic pectin film. The results showed that PA70 film combined with 1.5% FOS (fructooligosaccharides) had the highest number of viable cells of L. plantarum after 30 days of storage at 5 °C.

• Produce Safety

Heat resistance of Listeria monocytogenes persistent cells following osmotic stress in cooked pork sausages

• International Journal of Food Science & Technology

Bacterial persistence through retarded growth rate could seriously threaten food safety; however, its relevance in the food field still today remains underestimated. The present study provides new insights on the impact that this specific type of defence strategy can have on food safety using Listeria monocytogenes as a study model. Summary Persistent bacteria are subset of cells capable of surviving bactericidal treatments longer.

Development of a cellulose nanofiber composite film containing CuO/ZnO nanoparticles and its human norovirus inactivation properties in clams

• Sat, 08/31/2024 - 04:00
• Food Packaging and Shelf Life

Evaluation of the antimicrobial effect of oregano essential oil ( Origanum vulgare ) on cooked mussels ( Perna perna ) experimentally contaminated with Escherichia coli and Salmonella Enteritidis

• Food Control

Recent advances in shellfish toxin biosensing technologies: micro/nano molecule- and cell-based biosensors

• Trends in Food Science & Technology
• Natural toxins
• Shellfish toxins

Assessment of aroma release in filled chocolate wafers through electronic nose analysis

• European Food Research and Technology

Review of the existing maximum residue levels for difenoconazole according to Article 12 of Regulation (EC) No 396/2005

• EFSA Journal

Abstract According to Article 12 of Regulation (EC) No 396/2005, EFSA has reviewed the maximum residue levels (MRLs) currently established at European level for the pesticide active substance difenoconazole.

• Chemical contaminants
• Pesticide residues

Do lead (Pb) content of lipsticks expose a health risk to children? A risk assessment study

• Fri, 08/30/2024 - 04:00
• Journal of Public Health

Background Lead (Pb) content in lipsticks and potential life-long exposure of which might cause severe effects in consumers are an important concern for public. Thus, studies emphasize that lead exposure has no safe levels. Methods From 10 different brands, in total, 25 solid, gloss and creamy lipsticks are deployed from Turkish markets that are also categorized in two different price ranges.

• Heavy Metals

Time of arrival during plant disease progression and humidity additively influence Salmonella enterica colonization of lettuce

• Applied and Environmental Microbiology

Applied and Environmental Microbiology, Ahead of Print.

Lower respiratory tract microbiota in patients with clinically suspected nontuberculous mycobacterial pulmonary disease according to the presence of gastroesophageal reflux

• Thu, 08/29/2024 - 04:00

by Eun Jeong Won, Yu Jeong Lee, Moon-Ju Kim, Tae-Jong Kim, Hong-Joon Shin, Tae-Ok Kim, Yong-Soo Kwon

• Staphylococcus aureus

Yeast cell wall supplementation affects the Salmonella enteretidis load in the ceca and ovaries of layer pullets

• Poultry Science

Genomic analysis of foodborne Staphylococcus aureus obtained from unannounced food inspections between 2012 and 2021 in East China

• FEMS Microbiology Letters

Staphylococcus aureus is a significant cause of foodborne illness in China. Our investigation concentrated on the genetic characterization of foodborne S. aureus identified during unannounced inspections conducted in Suzhou from 2012 to 2021. Dominant clones included clonal complex (CC) 1, CC398, CC188, and CC7, with CC398 notably increasing in 2020–2021. The isolates commonly contained 1–3 plasmids, with rep5a (48.55%) and rep16 (44.51%) predominating.

Alleviation of cadmium uptake in rice (Oryza sativa L.) by iron plaque on the root surface generated by Providencia manganoxydans via Fe(II) oxidation

• Archives of Microbiology

Inhibition of Salmonella typhimurium infection in mice fed with live or heat‐killed Lactiplantibacillus plantarum MWFLp‐182

• International Journal of Dairy Technology

Pretreatment of live or heat‐killed Lactiplantibacillus plantarum MWFLp‐182 reduces Salmonella typhimurium infection. Live and heat‐killed L. plantarum MWFLp‐182 provides a defence mechanism against Salmonella infection by modulating different key KEGG enrichment pathways. Heat‐killed L. plantarum MWFLp‐182 also plays an effective role in reducing intestinal inflammation and preventing infection. The effects of both live and heat‐killed states of Lactiplantibacillus plantarum MWFLp‐182 (L.

Deer oil improves ulcerative colitis induced by DSS in mice by regulating the intestinal microbiota and SCFAs metabolism and modulating NF‐κB and Nrf2 signaling pathways

• Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture

Abstract BACKGROUND Deer oil (DO), a byproduct of deer meat processing, possesses high nutritional value. This study aims to evaluate the protective effects of DO on dextran sulfate sodium (DSS)‐induced ulcerative colitis (UC) in mice and to explore its potential mechanisms of action.

Cardiovascular risk in US adults with nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) vs. matched non-NASH controls, National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 2017–2020

• Wed, 08/28/2024 - 04:00

by Jonathan J. Woolley, Jesse Fishman, Christina M. Parrinello, Tom O’Connell

NASH is considered a contributor to atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) risk; however, its contribution beyond traditional risk factors for CVD, particularly diabetes, is less clearly understood. This study aimed to quantify the cardiovascular-event risk associated with NASH, independent of diabetes status.

A novel multimodal aptasensor for Patulin detection in fruit products based on high-performance RuMOF@hydrogel and versatile pericarp-derived carbonized polymer dots

• Food Chemistry

Assessment and genomic analysis of Salmonella and Campylobacter from different stages of an integrated no-antibiotics-ever (NAE) broiler complex: a longitudinal study

• Campylobacter

Effects of developmental exposure to arsenic species on behavioral stress responses in larval zebrafish and implications for stress-related disorders

• Toxicological Sciences

Arsenic (As) is globally detected in drinking water and food products at levels repeatedly surpassing regulatory thresholds. Several neurological and mental health risks linked to arsenic exposure are proposed; however, the nature of these effects and their association with the chemical forms of arsenic are not fully understood.

Co-exposure of polyvinyl chloride microplastics with cadmium promotes nonalcoholic fatty liver disease in female ducks through oxidative stress and glycolipid accumulation

• Mon, 08/26/2024 - 04:00

Inhibitory effects of potassium sorbate and ZnO nanoparticles on Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus in milk-based beverage

• Sun, 08/25/2024 - 04:00
• International Dairy Journal

Aspergillus flavus and aflatoxins control in long-term storage of food ingredients of Puerh tea, peanut and polished rice

Cadmium causes spleen toxicity in chickens by regulating mitochondrial unfolded protein response and nuclear receptors response, utilizing zebrafish embryos for replication of tulane virus: a human norovirus surrogate.

• Food and Environmental Virology

The zebrafish larvae/embryo model has been shown to support the replication of seven strains (G1.7[P7], GII.2[P16], GII.3[P16], GII.4[P4], GII.4[P16], GII.6[P7], and GII.17[P13]) of human norovirus (HuNoV). However, due to challenges in consistently obtaining HuNoV-positive stool samples from clinical sources, evaluating HuNoV surrogates in this model is highly valuable. This study assesses the potential of zebrafish embryos and larvae as a model for Tulane virus (TuV) replication.

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Interactions between Street Food and Food Safety Topics in the Scientific Literature—A Bibliometric Analysis with Science Mapping

Claudio bellia.

1 Department of Agricultural Food and Environment (Di3A), Università degli Studi di Catania, 95100 Catania, Italy; [email protected]

Simona Bacarella

2 Department of Agricultural, Food and Forest Sciences (SAAF), Università degli Studi di Palermo, 90128 Palermo, Italy; [email protected]

Marzia Ingrassia

Associated data.

Not applicable.

Street food (SF) consists of ready-to-eat food prepared and sold on the street. This food constitutes the food traditions of local populations in many countries of the world. SF characterizes a large number of cities around the world, from New York to Paris, from Palermo to cities of North Africa, China, India and Japan. SF is inexpensive and prepared following traditional methods that meet local consumer preferences, culinary culture and lifestyles. Moreover, SF allows a unique experience for tourists who also want to experience a destination through traditional food consumed on the street together with the locals. Nevertheless, SF is linked to several health hazards. Hence, several studies discussed on the compliance with hygiene and food quality requirements that SF vendors should guarantee, to ensure human health. So far, there is no bibliometric review attempting to provide an objective and comprehensive analysis of the existing scientific documents that simultaneously study the scientific topic of SF linked to that of Food Safety (FS). Therefore, the objective of this paper is to provide a theoretical framework of the interactions between studies on SF and FS topics, in order to discover if the combined topic of “Street Food Safety” (SFS) was investigated as a topic in its own right. A bibliometric analysis was carried out analyzing 276 scientific contributions from the last 21 years, indexed in the Elsevier Scopus database and in the Clarivate Web of Science database. The results showed a very strong interaction between the two topics and many others in several scientific sectors; In particular, the topic of SFS involves many disciplines of social sciences. The results highlight that the scientific topic of SFS exists but not consciously, and it is believed that the research interest in this topic can grow considerably in the coming years, also because of the current COVID-19 pandemic situation that we are experiencing.

1. Introduction

Street food (SF) belongs to the culture of many populations around the world. In particular, it is a food usually eaten in many cities of continents such as Africa, India, Asia and Latin America [ 1 ]. Street food and street food vendors are particularly popular in under-developed regions and countries, where they constitute a relevant part of their economy [ 2 , 3 , 4 ]. However, SF represents a fundamental part of the eating habits in many cities of the most developed countries. As a fundamental part of the local culture, SF is often an attraction for visitors/tourists in many cities and countries of the world (e.g., New York in the USA, Paris, Vienna, Lisbon, Madrid, Rome and Palermo in Europe, but also in Greece, Turkey and other countries of the Mediterranean Basin) [ 5 , 6 ]. According to the FAO definition, street foods are ready-to-eat foods and beverages prepared and/or sold by vendors or hawkers especially in the streets and other similar places. SF includes a very wide quantity of products of animal and vegetable origin, grilled or fried, seasoned and served according to local traditions [ 7 ].

SF is gaining increased popularity in both under-developed and developed countries [ 8 ]. It is clear that the consumption of SF is due to different factors depending on whether we are referring to a more developed or non-developed country. In fact, for millions of low- and middle-income consumers in urban areas of developing countries, street food is a substantial component of their daily diet. For them, street foods may be the cheapest and most accessible way to have a nutritionally balanced meal outside of the home, provided that the consumer is knowledgeable and capable of selecting the right combination of foods. Moreover, in developing countries with inadequate education or skills, preparing and selling street food is a reliable source of income. Differently, in some developed countries, SF is considered an additional tourist attraction. Think about the so-called “food & wine” tourism that, for example in Italy, attracts millions of interested tourists every year to try the typical street food and live a complete and inclusive experience together with the inhabitants of the place they are visiting [ 9 , 10 ]. SF is a conscious way to show tourists and visitors part of the cultural identity of the local population, the so called “food identity” [ 11 ]. SF allows a unique experience for tourists who also want to experience a destination through traditional food consumed on the street together with the locals [ 12 ]. Street food vendors, along the road, become a meeting point between locals and visitors, between tasting and storytelling [ 9 ]. This point was addressed by some authors that described street food as a “diversified touristic attraction and offer” [ 9 ], as it allows, at the same time, tourists to explore culinary traditions of the visited country/city and the territory of origin of the products tasted. This contributes to have a unique experience of travel and knowledge of places and cultures of which the food itself contributes to maintaining a positive memory [ 13 ]. It is linked to broader concept of experience that include cultural heritage, food quality, local food products, health, and food safety [ 12 ].

However, street food can also exert negative impacts in the long term on human health and the environment, such as pollution, damage to biodiversity, etc. [ 14 ]. Additionally, SF has some problems connected to food safety, hygiene, and food quality, which can compromise the health of consumers, both during the immediate consumption and in the long term (due to cooking and preparation methods) [ 15 ]. According to FAO, local governments, international organizations, and consumer groups are becoming aware of the socioeconomic relevance of street foods, as well as the risks that come with them [ 15 ]. Food safety is the primary concern, but other issues such as sanitation (waste accumulation in the streets and clogged wastewater drains), traffic congestion in the city, including for pedestrians (occupation of sidewalks by street vendors and traffic accidents), illegal occupation of public or private space, and social issues have also been raised (child labor, unfair competition to formal trade, etc.). In many parts of the world, the possibility of serious food poisoning outbreaks linked to street foods remains a concern. A lack of understanding of the causes of food-borne illness among street food vendors is a problem. The relationship between street food (SF) and food safety (FS) is particularly interesting, due to its importance the global economy. In recent decades, the subject of FS has taken on a significance linked to the economic development of the countries to which it refers [ 16 , 17 ]. In fact, FS is generally associated with the probability of contracting diseases due to the qualitative characteristics of the food or to the lack of compliance of SF vendors with the minimum health and hygiene requirements [ 18 ]. For example, it is important for consumers to adopt some caution, such as avoiding raw foods, because the preservation methods required to keep them fresh are rarely possible on the street, or avoiding drinking running water [ 14 , 15 ]. It is also important that the surfaces on which food is processed and cooked are well cleaned and that fresh foods are stored in refrigerators. Finally, the handling of money with hands before serving or eating the food is another problem [ 3 , 7 , 14 ].

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the sanitary crisis, the consumers’ behavior in regard to food consumption and purchasing has significantly changed, particularly in urban cities in the most developed countries in the world [ 19 ]. Because of the persistence of lockdowns and the fear of the spread of contagions, consumers avoided traditional neighborhood markets of fresh foods, for the need of social distancing, and reduced the consumption of SF, preferring to buy food at supermarkets or grocery stores, often online, or requesting for home delivery [ 20 ]. In addition, it was observed that consumers stocked up essential items at home, and these behaviors largely remained even after the reopening [ 21 ]. Additionally, the SF economic sector was significantly affected, not only with regard to the lower number of local consumers but also for the absence of tourists/visitors, which is also an economic loss for SF sellers [ 22 , 23 ].

Because of the above-explained variation of food safety with geography, the term “Street Food Safety” calls for stronger contextualization and substantiation.

Despite the importance of studying issues related to the healthiness and safety of SF, notwithstanding scientific progress made in this field, bibliometric analysis of scientific works published on these topics is still lacking. Literature on SF begins around the end of nineties [ 24 ], and some studies have been conducted on SF and FS about specific topics such as hygienic practices [ 25 , 26 ], food allergens [ 27 ] and others, such as the tourism economic perspective for small enterprises [ 28 , 29 , 30 ]. Nevertheless, there is no bibliometric analysis attempting to provide an objective and comprehensive analysis of the existing interactions between these two topics. Abrahale et al., which presents a scoping review concerning SF and its socio-health aspects [ 31 ], and another Bouafou et al., [ 32 ] on food science and technology, and there are a few recent works in the literature on SF around the world and the risk perception toward FS in SF [ 33 , 34 ].

Therefore, the study of the links between the scientific topics SF and FS appears of interest for researchers that want to know how different disciplines, fields, expertise and documents/authors relate to each other while investigating those two topics, and discover any existence of a further scientific topic related to them, that is, “Street Food Safety” (SFS). This study focused on the two scientific topics of research, SF and FS, with the aim to highlight any strand of research concerned with studying the combined topic SFS or the two topics separately. Moreover, this study aims to identify which scientific fields emerge in which these two topics (SF and FS) are studied together, or in which field the specific SFS topic is studied. Specifically, the object of this paper was to discover, based on the empirical evidence, any existing objectively demonstrable interaction between the scientific topics of SF and FS, and the existence of the scientific field of research regarding “Street Food Safety”. The research questions were:

RQ1. What relation is there between street food and food safety topics in the scientific literature?

RQ2. What is the current scientific literature analyzing the “derived” composed topic “Street Food Safety”, by focusing on leading scientific contributions?

To answer these questions, we conducted a bibliometric analysis of the literature based on scientific mapping [ 35 , 36 ] in order to highlight any aspect of the bibliometric links between SF topic and FS topic and any existence of the topic “Street Food Safety” highlighted by authors who have studied this theme in any scientific sector (not necessarily the field of exact sciences). Results provided an interesting insight into current research trends and potential directions for future research.

2. Materials and Methods

Following the objectives of this study, it was considered more appropriate to combine two methodological approaches. First, the PRISMA protocol [ 35 ], a proven procedure in the field of “systematic literature reviews” and “meta-analyses” that provides transparency and replicability to the review. By the use of this procedure, it was possible to obtain a representative set of scientific documents regarding the topics of “Street Food”, “Food Safety” and “Street Food Safety”. Moreover, using scientific mapping analysis (or bibliometric mapping analysis, using “keywords” analysis, co-citation analysis and “co-occurrence analysis”, it was possible to highlight how disciplines, fields, expertise and individual documents or authors relate to each other [ 34 , 37 ]. Both techniques have been used in previous works [ 35 , 36 ]. Keyword and co-occurrence investigation provided a theoretical framework of the relations between studies on SF and FS topics, and the combined topic of “Street Food Safety” (SFS), particularly the interactions between the three topics in diverse disciplines and the most interesting studies published related to these research themes (co-citation analysis).

2.1. Bibliometric Analysis

An extensive literature search, a chronological/conceptual review of international literature, was conducted in March 2021 and in February 2022, with the aim to find out scientific documents published from 2000 to 2021 (included) discussing the relations between the topics “Street Food” and “Food Safety” [ 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 ]. This analysis was carried out on documents published from 2000 because, during the last 21 years, consumers and the scientific community have started to take more into consideration the problems linked to the risks to human health of the consumption of certain foods. In addition to that, the importance of the controls on foods quality and food safety have increased since that time, especially in developing countries, where the issue of food safety is still a very important public health issue.

The Clarivate Web of Science and the Elsevier Scopus databases were used for this study. The choice to combine these two databases allowed to reduce greatly any type of bias in the selection of data sources, as it ensured an adequate number and model of document classification according to the purpose of this study. In fact, it was thought to have a sufficient number of medium to high quality documents covering the natural and social sciences, both sectoral and interdisciplinary, within a formal or applied sciences system [ 41 ]. Moreover, the choice of the two databases appeared the most suitable to have a more heterogeneous significant sample, because of the high number of journals of medium–high quality indexed. Among all the scientific database, Google Scholar was excluded because it indexes many non-scientific papers. Finally, the PubMed database specializes in “biomedical literature”, and was therefore too sectorial, and not suitable for our investigation. Regarding the language used, there were selected scientific documents published in all languages.

The first step of the used method concerned the research and selection of the studies under investigation in the two databases.

Usually, PRISMA protocol is used in systematic literature reviews to show a series of successive stages that allowed us to select the relevant documents for the study. In this study, the PRISMA protocol was applied ( Figure 1 ) because, similarly to other bibliometric reviews [ 34 ], it appeared suitable to simplify the understanding of the study design followed, providing transparency and replicability of the review.

Inclusion and exclusion criteria using PRISMA protocol. Final number of documents observed N = 276.

The initial search was screened and refined using the Elsevier “Search within” function, applying multiple combinations with article titles, abstract and keywords. The search terms were selected in line with previous research in the field of street food [ 35 , 36 ] used Boolean strategies that are: “Street Food” AND/OR “Food Safety” OR “Street Food Safety”. Through this procedure, a first database was created (identification).

After the first step of identifying the sample for analysis, the times when pairs of articles within the sample were cited in the other scientific documents within the entire Elsevier Scopus database were counted [ 35 , 36 ].

During the last twenty-one years, there has been a strong increased interest from academics for the topics concerning street food and/or food safety; therefore, it was decided to consider for this study all documents published from 2000. The extraction rules were limited the extrapolation only to scientific articles, books/book chapters and reviews fully published in Journals between 2000 and 2021 (included), written in all languages. It is possible that after 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the interest of researchers on street food safety increased further; therefore, this study can be continued into the future.

Duplicates and documents not providing original data (e.g., opinion papers), and study protocols were excluded. So, the initial database consisted of N = 414 documents.

From the initial database of documents, it was created a second database (N = 370), after having checked the consistence of contents with the words searched as representative of the research topics (SF, FS and SFS).

The final database consisted of N = 276 documents eligible for the bibliometric analysis, which included 231 articles (83.69%), 30 book chapters (10.86%) and 15 reviews (5.43%).

A first analysis of the selected documents was performed using basic quantitative statistics in order to know the characteristics of documents included in the final database (FD), such as year of publication, authors, type of document, document citations, scientific areas, countries, etc.

Subsequently, with the frequencies obtained some multivariate statistical techniques were applied, with the aim to identify the existent structure of connection among the documents based on the terms considered representative of the observed topics (SF, FS and SFS). For this BA, the software Microsoft VOSviewer (version 1.6.16.) was used. This (Van-Eck & Waltman, 2011, 2020) software allows researchers to create two-dimensional maps for the construction and visualization of bibliometric networks [ 42 , 43 ]. It enables us to build keyword networks extracted from scientific literature, using a text mining functionality. Using this software, it was possible to carry out the scientific mapping.

2.2. Science Map Analysis

The so-called scientific mapping, or “science maps”, are spatial representations that help to visualize the relations that arise among documents, based on links between authors, bibliographic references, journals, disciplines, and specific words. This type of network analysis allows researchers to search into the content of documents through the co-occurrence of “specific words” (SW) (or key-words). This methodology is especially suitable to know the intellectual structure of a specific research field or topic of interest. According to previous studies [ 34 , 36 ], the SW used in the content of documents and those contained in titles, abstracts and keywords are essential for the identification of significant topics within a specific research topic of issue.

The visual representation of the Science Map can be obtained using any bibliometric software [ 34 , 36 ]. For this study, the VOSviewer [ 42 , 43 ] appeared the most suitable because it provides a high-quality overview of targeted research topics. However, the information underlying the visual representations provided by the software is certainly of interest. In this study, due to the graphical power of the software, and the meaning of each of the visual representations, we wanted to know the relationships between the topics of “Street Food” and “Food Safety” and any scientific interest in the topic identified as “Street food Safety”, despite the possible non-use of the specific keyword.

Thanks to VOSviewer, the importance of a SW (node) is represented by its relative position in the network. The software calculates the importance of all the SW selected and displays the largest possible number of thematic networks. The node size represents the importance of those words, based on the frequency of occurrences [ 43 ]. Links between nodes denote the number of times words appear together, and the thickness of the link means the strength of the link.

Special words’ map analysis and links’ strength analysis (co-occurrence analysis) were performed. The co-occurrence analysis allowed us to discover any relations arising among the documents selected and the entity/strength of these relations (links), which consists of distances and label size, based on the frequency of words co-occurrences. Therefore, VOSviewer provided a visual representation of the networks among the three topics investigated: street food, food safety and street food safety.

This study provides the first bibliometric analysis (BA) and classification framework of the existing literature about street food and food safety and the bibliometric links between these two scientific topics. The aim was to know if the topic “Street Food Safety” was an existing cross-sectorial topic of interest for researchers, and what were the main scientific areas in which this issue was studied as relevant topic.

The final database (FD) consisted of 276 documents published and indexed in the two databases in the period between January 2000 and December 2021.

3.1. Analysis of the Selected Manuscripts: Data Description and Classification

Through this BA, it was possible to classify the documents observed by author names, title, year of publication, document’s type, journal’s title, and number of citations by other scientific documents. Despite the fact that there are several publications documenting these topics in various parts of the world, the most frequently cited publications are, primarily, cases studied in Africa and South America. Most of them are documents focusing on specific case studies on food safety of street food, with some theoretical contribution to existing theories. This might be because the problem of food safety of street food is very relevant in those world areas.

Results shows a progressive increase, albeit non-linear, from 2000 until 2021, of publications regarding topics of street food and food safety, as shown in Figure 2 .

Evolution of the number of articles (276 documents observed) published per year.

It can be noticed that the number of scientific documents published increased significantly in 2014 (11.59% of the total 276 documents observed). Specifically, most of the published documents on the studied topics (204 documents, equal to 73.91% of total documents observed) were published between 2014 and 2022, with the exception of 2015, where there were only 12 articles, but that year was the only one not in line with the trend of the last 8 years.

Figure 3 shows the number of scientific documents on the topics SF and FS published from 2000 to 2021, by focused country.

Frequency of the scientific papers about street food and food safety by focused country.

It can be seen that India, with 35 documents on SF and/or FS (12.68% of the 276 documents), was the country with the highest number of interested authors; following India were Brazil, USA and Ghana, with more than 20 documents, South Africa with 20 documents (7.2% of total 276 documents), and then Indonesia (16 documents, 5.8%), Nigeria (4.3%), UK (4.3%) and Bangladesh (3.6%). This result highlights that generally, in the occidental countries and specifically in the EU, the topic of food safety for street food is not considered an issue, possibly thanks to specific strict regulations to preserve food quality and to maintain a high level of sanitary standards. Moreover, street food is much more frequently sold and consumed as a regular meal in developing countries than in those more developed [ 25 , 29 , 44 ].

Figure 4 shows a high heterogeneity of documents and the diversity of the research fields where the topics SF and/or FS were studied (12 research field in total), according to the number of documents published in the selected databases.

Number of published documents by research field.

The five research fields with more documents were: agricultural and biological sciences (included agricultural economics) with 137 documents—49.63% of the total (276); medicine (81 documents) 29.34% of the total; social sciences (48 document on 276) 17.39% of the total database; biochemistry, genetics and molecular biology 16.3% (45 documents) and immunology and microbiology 36 documents—13%. Following these were environmental science, engineering, business management and accounting, nursing, multidisciplinary, pharmacology and economics, econometrics and finance. In this scenario, it is interesting to observe that social sciences is a field where SF and FS were studied relatively frequently (almost 20% of the total documents observed), and also in combination.

Table 1 shows the top 20 most cited documents in the SD. Specifically, the manuscript of Mensah et al. (2002) [ 44 ] has the highest number of citations, 202 citations, among all the publications observed in the FD on an article analyzing safety and healthiness of street food in a city of Ghana. It is followed by a review of Rane (2011) [ 45 ], with a citation frequency of 103, that analyzes the problems of risks related to street food. By observing all the articles in this Table, it is possible to notice that the most recurring themes are the relationship between street food and the hygiene of the place where it is sold and consumed, and the fact that it has become an important public health issue in the developing continents. Other aspects investigated by the authors are related to the socio-economic role of the street food vendors. Most of these are documents published on very sectorial journals concerning food safety, knowledge and risk, etc. such as the journal “Food control”, which deals with these issues.

Rank of first 20 most cited articles.

Note: Our elaboration on data from Elsevier Scopus and Web of Science Database, 2022.

3.2. VOSviewer Results: Science Maps

All the SW contained in the titles, abstracts and keywords of the 276 selected documents were selected, and they consisted of 797 words to be analyzed (census) [ 42 , 43 ]. Previously, the database was manually cleaned of duplicates, plural words, and other words considered not relevant for this study (e.g., “analysis”, “theory”, “study”, “review”, etc.). At the end, the words database consisted of 110 words. The 110 selected words were analyzed using the VOSviewer software, with the final result a science map showing the relationships between the various SWs, and among them, plus their association through the thematic clusters highlighted ( Figure 5 ).

VOSviewer keywords analysis and co-occurrences in the selected documents.

In the map, it was possible to see clearly the bibliometric links between the two topics observed (SF and FS) and all the other correlated SW in the selected documents. As shown in Figure 5 , following the “VOSviewer keywords analysis” each node is a word, the larger the node, the higher the frequency of occurrence of the word identifying it. The lines between two nodes (links) and their thickness indicates the co-occurrence of two words in the same document. Specifically, links between/among nodes indicates that two or more words appear in the same document, and the thicker the line, the higher the frequency of word co-occurrence [ 42 , 43 ]. Moreover, the thickness of the link indicates the strength of the link based on co-occurrences. The network connections show the words that appear together more frequently in the analyzed documents. Thus, it is possible to identify clearly the most prevalent/important research topics discussed in the research/study documents, according to their authors.

The “VOSviewer keywords analysis” [ 42 , 43 ] highlighted two big clusters based on the 110 words analyzed. These words are displayed in the science map with 306 links that connect them to each other, highlighting the multidisciplinary approach to issues related to SF and FS.

The nodes’ size indicates the weight of the SW, i.e., its occurrences. Food safety is the biggest node, followed by Street Food. The word “Food Safety” appears in almost half of the documents in the selected database; consequently, this node is the biggest one, having the highest number of co-occurrences with the other linked words, and it clusters the largest number of correlated topics.

The second biggest cluster is that of the topic “Street Food”, which is obvious considering that these two words were the ones selected as “key-selection words” in the first phase of sampling in the Elsevier Scopus database. However, the interesting thing is the strength of the link between these two topics, which shows that there is high interest of research for the two combined topics of SF and FS. Furthermore, the nodes and the links discovered show what are the other principal topics studied in combination with SF and FS, this highlights the scientific sectors and issues wherein these two topics are studied together.

Very few documents (1.5% of the total documents observed) contained the word “Street Food Safety” in their titles, abstracts and keywords, regarding microbial safety, social determinants of health, public health intervention and food safety education in elementary school students. Due to the low frequency with which this word has been detected, it does not appear in the visual representation provided by the software.

It can be observed that the strongest connections of FS are with topics related to human health issues, such as “food”, “hygiene”, “nutrition”, “hazard” and “contamination”. Moreover, the most important connections with SF are other topics related to consumers and their awareness of SF hazards and SF characteristics, e.g., topics such as: “consumers”, “knowledge”, “street vendors”, “hazard”, “hygiene practices”, “women” and “nutrition”.

Table 2 shows the most relevant words found in the analysed documents based on occurrences and links’ strength.

Rank of the 15 most frequent keywords, occurrences and links’ strength.

Note: Our elaboration of data extracted from selected documents.

From the total of 276 selected articles and review documents, the keyword “Food Safety” was found in 79 documents, reflecting a percentage of 28.6% of the total number of documents, with the highest strength of the links (LS 180) that correlate it with other topics. It is not surprising that this topic is followed by “Street Food” with a frequency of 48, which is 17.2% of the 279 selected articles and a link strength (LS) of 104. Other frequent SW are “hygiene” (8.3%) and “vendors” (4.3%). “Consumers”, “Food hygiene” and “Es. Coli” (2.9%) are moderately frequent, although not as relevant as the first ones. These results show that the other SW do not have their own capability to be a multidisciplinary topic, because their combination with any of the other word observed is modest. On the other hand, these findings show the relevance of combination among SF and FS topics and other topics such as “consumers”, “food hygiene”, “knowledge”, “nutrition and diseases” and the way in which the issue of food safety of SF is studied.

Figure 6 displays the clusters’ density. This Figure shows the same bibliographic findings of Figure 5 , but without networks. In this Figure, the intensity/density of the color reveals the weight of each cluster measured by the number of items belonging to that cluster in the neighborhood of the point [ 36 , 37 ].

Density visualization performed by the VOSviewer program.

The density of Cluster 1, with 58 words (data not shown) (63%), addresses “Food Safety” issues. Cluster 2 (density of 33 words) addresses street food issues, with a weaker cooperation strength than that of Cluster 1. The similar colors and their intensity show cooperation strength of the words, which identifies the topics studied in the same document.

Nevertheless, the interesting finding that emerges from this result is that the highest density is located in the proximity of the word FS and SF. Therefore, it is possible to demonstrate that a line of research, or a field, that studies issues and themes regarding “ Street Food Safety ” exists, despite the fact that this “key”-word is used very rarely in the selected documents.

4. Discussion

Through this pilot research, using a bibliometric analysis of scientific documents on the topics “Street Food” and “Food Safety”, it was attempted to discover the scientific interactions and connections between the two topics.

The first finding that emerges from the results is that the interest to pursue research related to food safety within street food sector has significantly increased during the last 21 years; in fact, between 2000 and 2021, the number of articles on street food, food safety and their connection increased progressively ( Figure 2 ). The aim of the studies observed was to study how to increase food safety and hygiene during preparation and consumption of street food and also the consumers’/vendors’ knowledge about this issue [ 64 , 65 , 66 , 67 , 68 , 69 ]. Although the SFS covers a wide range of subject categories, a large proportion of the publications were related to street food and food safety separately. Specifically, it is possible to note that in the Cluster 1, according to the topics found [ 51 , 70 , 71 ], groups all the documents where the issue of food safety is discussed, and Cluster 2 groups documents about street food. Interactions between the street food topic and food safety, and other relevant research topics, show that relations are mainly related to economic topics [ 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 ].

The analysis of the 279 selected documents highlights the increasing interest of researchers for issues of SF for human health, and thus the importance of FS for global and local policies [ 2 , 74 , 75 ]. Almost all public health challenges are discussed with regard to specific geographic areas, so there is an increase in the number of journals in these fields, journals such as Foods , Food Control , International Journal of Food Microbiology , etc.

The interactions between SF and FS can be also found by observing the other research sectors linked to them, such as “food allergies”, “diseases and hygiene”, “nutrition” and “food contamination” issues [ 1 , 55 , 76 , 77 ]. Topics related to nutrition, hygiene practices, food safety knowledge, hazard, contamination, microbiological quality, risk assessment, and others were the most discussed in the identified articles, showing some common issues of great concern. Much research has been conducted in developing countries [ 2 , 76 , 77 ].

Moreover, street food and food safety issues are closely related to the food system topics. In fact, most of the documents were included in the research area “Agricultural and Biological science” in which there are journals dealing with issues of “Agricultural Economics”. SFS research involves about 84% of all subject categories, meaning that there are numerous perspectives of research and scientific studies on the specific topic of SFS. The study found that SFS topics are studied mainly with regard to developing countries, such as India, Brazil and Ghana, which have undeveloped economies and little investment in scientific research. Nevertheless, this topic is also covered with regard to the USA. In fact, SFS cannot disregard based on political, socio-economic and environmental regional characteristics; nevertheless, the current bias in geographical distribution of SFS research seems acceptable and thus it allows the generalization of findings.

It is believed that further research targeting developed countries is needed [ 66 , 78 , 79 , 80 , 81 ], and also the analysis of documents written in different languages other than English and indexed in other scientific databases, because they address these themes and topics from different point of view and with a more systemic approach.

This pilot study, with BA [ 81 ], contributes to the actual research showing a new latent field of research on “Street Food Safety”, because of the revealed closed links between the two topics, particularly in the research areas of medicine, agricultural economics, biological sciences, and social sciences. Therefore, this opens up a new potential research field in the literature. This novelty of findings may be of interest for other authors interested in studying the Street Food Safety issues from a broader interdisciplinary perspective, and not necessarily linked only to food hygiene or public health issues. In fact, results clearly show that there is an existing research interest on the SFS topic that includes other topics of cross-sectoral interest, studied primarily by academics of social sciences (agricultural economics, agricultural politics, economics, etc.), e.g., food quality topics, quality certifications, of the traceability and retraceability of a food product, block-chain, etc.

Limitations and Future Lines of Research

The aim of this study was to contribute to the knowledge of the specific broad interest research sector of Street Food Safety . This pilot study, using BA [ 80 , 81 ], opens the door for future analysis by combining other databases of research documents that can confirm or contrast our results. However, the results of this study have some limitations that need to be addressed in future studies, and do not offer a unique view of reality. In particular, the most important is that, although we were able to obtain objective results on the topic of SF and FS and with regard to the discovered latent topic of Street Food Safety, some reasons behind these results are still not explained. Therefore, a more detailed analysis of the studies about the topic of Street Food Safety in developed countries appears useful in adjusting the geographic distribution of research documents analyzed. Therefore, to address this limitation, which is typical of BA [ 80 , 81 ], future research could be carried out with the using statistical methods suitable for explorative studies in social sciences. Additionally, these results could be integrated with a systematic literature review. However, the complexity of the phenomenon and its importance demonstrates that more research need to be conducted on the extensive topic of Street Food Safety.

5. Conclusions

This study is the first bibliometric analysis and classification framework to review systematically the status of the existing literature on the topic of “Street Food Safety” highlighting the bibliometric links between street food topic and food safety topic. The aim was to know if the topic “Street Food Safety” was an existing cross sectorial topic of interest for researchers, and what were the main scientific areas in which this issue was studied as relevant topic. A quantification of the increase in SFS-related interdisciplinary topics was made in order to highlight the importance that the scientific topic of SFS in acquiring progressively during the last 21 years (from 2000 to 2021).

Through the co-occurrence analysis of research countries and journals, and to citation analysis [ 35 , 36 , 81 ] we found that most research is performed in developing countries and that these countries have similar problems related to food safety of street food and health of regular consumers of street food. Furthermore, keywords analysis, co-occurrence analysis and cluster analysis, revealed the current research focus and trends [ 36 ]. Researchers are focused on one main aspect: food security related to street food preparation and consumption in the daily diet of consumers. This finding highlights that there is a developing field of research on the topic “Street Food Safety” and on all the other topics related to it. Specifically, the research sectors where authors investigate on this topic are those of the social sciences where topics are studied using an integrated and systemic view. Therefore, more research should be carried out in the future investigating documents that focus on developed countries also using other database to complete the analysis.

Abbreviations

The following abbreviations are used in this manuscript:

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, C.B. and M.I.; methodology, C.B. and M.I.; software, C.B.; validation, C.B. and M.I.; formal analysis, S.B., C.B. and M.I.; investigation, C.B.; resources, S.B. and M.I.; data curation, C.B. and M.I.; project administration, C.B. and M.I.; writing—original draft preparation, C.B. and M.I.; writing—review and editing, S.B., C.B. and M.I.; visualization, S.B. and M.I.; supervision, C.B. and M.I.; funding acquisition, S.B., C.B. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

This research was partially funded by the research fund “FFR 2021 Prof. Simona Bacarella” And partially funded by the research project “Sostenibilità economica, ambientale e sociale del sistema agroalimentare del mediterraneo”, Principal investigator Prof. Claudio Bellia funded by PIAno di inCEntivi per la Ricerca di Ateneo (PIACERI) UNICT 2020/22 line 2, UPB: 5A722192154, University of Catania.

Institutional Review Board Statement

Informed consent statement, data availability statement, conflicts of interest.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

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150+ Food Research Paper Topics Ideas for Students

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How to Choose the “Ideal” Food Research Topics

150+ ideas of experimental research titles about food, research title about food processing.

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If you are unsure what title about food to work on for your research paper, here we are. Below are some of the best examples of thesis titles or professional thesis writers about food for students and researchers.

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Interesting Research Topics Fast Food

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• Lifestyle-related chronic diseases
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• Food in the 21st century
• The Slow Food movement
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• Food safety: role in gene pool preservation
• Controlling synthetic colors used in food
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• Human rights to balanced nutrition
• Quality of food products in urban areas
• Food in rural areas vs. urban areas
• Food security in Uganda
• Food safety: developed vs. developing countries
• Food factor in biopolitics
• Corn starch in baking: the importance
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• Normal butter vs. brown butter
• Matcha in Japanese pastry
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From food innovation research titles to food sustainability research topics , there are many areas of the food industry to explore. With the list of topics and tips for choosing a topic provided here, finding your ideal topic should be easier.

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• Frontiers in Food Science and Technology
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Biopolymers as Food Ingredients

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Natural biopolymers, including polysaccharides, proteins, and lipids are widely used in the food industry. They are polymers isolated from plants, animals, and microorganisms. Their unique properties enhance the texture, flavor, and nutritional value of food products. For example, cellulose-based biopolymers are valued for their functional properties such as emulsifying, gelling, and thickening. Biopolymer production is typically environmentally friendly, which is preferable over synthetic alternatives. The integration of biopolymers in food products can also enhance their health benefits. For instance, konjac glucomannan enhances satiety, reduces body weight, lowers cholesterol and glucose levels, and promotes cholesterol elimination. This Research Topic aims to explore the properties of natural biopolymers, optimize their isolation methods, and investigate their potential applications. Understanding the unique properties of each natural biopolymer is essential to match them with the appropriate application. Meanwhile, investigating new methods for their isolation or modification will help reduce costs, maintain food safety, and introduce beneficial properties. Additionally, exploring more possibilities for biopolymer applications is crucial for innovations in the food industry. For example, health dietary foods can be developed based on customer demand, incorporating specific characteristics such as dietary fiber content, protein content, and total calories, while also ensuring desired flavor and texture. The scope of this Research Topic focuses on the comprehensive discussion of natural biopolymers, including their properties, isolation methods, and potential applications. We welcome the submission of Original Research, Reviews, Mini Reviews, and Perspective articles on themes including, but not limited to: - Novel methods for biopolymer isolation; - Biopolymers' structure-property relationship; - Chemical and physical properties of biopolymers; - Modification of biopolymers and its effects on biopolymer properties; - Integration of biopolymers into food products; - New applications of biopolymers for the food industry.

Keywords : Polysaccharides, Proteins, Lipids, Biopolymers, Additives

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