Scientific research isn't much use if the people who might benefit from it never see the results. Food researchers have launched an initiative to make sure their findings get into the public domain as quickly as possible.The new website makes the results of Irish food research available to all, says Dick Ahlstrom
The new web-based service, which was launched last week, is known as Relay, and it does what it says, delivering the results of the Food Institutional Research Measure, the national food- research programme, to those who might make use of it.
Results from all publicly funded food-research projects since 1994 have been assembled on the site, which is at www.relayresearch.ie, says Jim Flanagan, the chairman of the FIRM committee. "It is designed to ensure that the results of research are disseminated."
The new service is based at Teagasc's Moorepark research centre, in Fermoy, but anyone can access the results over the web.
The latest findings reaching the site arise from FIRM, a €70million programme funded under the 2000-2006 National Development Plan. So far, 70 FIRM projects in 15 research institutes and universities have been allocated €35 million in the areas of food safety, consumer foods, dairy products, meat, food ingredients and nutrition.
While food-research funding under the 1994-9 development plan was targeted at building up research facilities, the current programme is meant to bolster the "innovation capacity within food companies", says Flanagan. Relay is, therefore, particularly targeted at businesses. "It is trying to generate jobs and economic activity by developing Irish food companies."
FIRM itself does not require the involvement of any company, so researchers looking for funding can tackle anything from basic research to near-to-market studies. The idea, however, is that research findings will help companies here to improve products, product safety and nutritional content or to develop new products.
Success would be "measured by Irish food companies adding more value to Irish foods" and "ensuring the food consumers eat is safe, more nutritious and healthier", says Flanagan.
A "green technology" research project aimed at developing a way to improve food safety without the use of chemical preservatives is a good example of what FIRM is trying to do.
Researchers at Moorepark have joined with colleagues at University College, Cork, to form Cork Bacteriocin Group, which is looking at a natural antimicrobial agent produced by a food organism. Dr Paul Ross of Teagasc and Dr Colin Hill of the microbiology department at UCC lead the partnership. "One of the things about FIRM is it has promoted institutional relationships to a new level," says Ross.
The work is based on the discovery in Cork several years ago of a bacteria-killing substance released by a common food bacterium. Researchers isolated the active element, two peptides - chains of amino acids - that can kill gram-positive bacteria such as the dangerous listeria and staphylococcus and the deadly botulinum.
"The research looks at food-grade proteins which kill or inhibit bacteria," says Ross. "Over the last seven years we have filed three patents on it." Ongoing research on the substance, called lacticin 3147, has also produced about 30 peer- reviewed papers.
The material can be used "to improve the safety of food as a possible alternative to chemical preservatives", says Ross. It is also effective against the highly dangerous antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains referred to as MSRA organisms.
The researchers have found that the bacterium can be grown in a food product or the peptides can be harvested and then added to a product. "We can use the functioning bacteria to make food products and the products then have an inbuilt protection against bacteria."
It has been tested in powdered soup and baby formula; new work involves assessing its performance in powdered milk. The peptides are destroyed in the stomach and have no residual effect when eaten in foods.
The lacticin 3147 research has involved numerous collaborations with teams abroad, Dr Ross says, including scientists in Germany and Canada. It has been used in an antimastitis product for cattle and may have applications as an antibacterial in topical wound dressings or to destroy MSRA organisms on surfaces.