Food Scientists and Technologist Use chemistry, microbiology, engineering, and other sciences to study the principles underlying the processing and deterioration of foods; analyze food content to determine levels of vitamins, fat, sugar, and protein; discover new food sources; research ways to make processed foods safe, palatable, and healthful; and apply food science knowledge to determine best ways to process, package, preserve, store, and distribute food.
Food Scientists and Technologist is Also Know as
In different settings, Food Scientists and Technologist is titled as
- Food and Drug Research Scientist
- Food Chemist
- Food Engineer
- Food Scientist
- Food Technologist
- Formulator
- Product Development Scientist
- Research Chef
- Research Food Technologist
- Research Scientist
Education and Training of Food Scientists and Technologist
Food Scientists and Technologist is categorized in Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed
Experience Required for Food Scientists and Technologist
A considerable amount of work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is needed for these occupations. For example, an accountant must complete four years of college and work for several years in accounting to be considered qualified.
Education Required for Food Scientists and Technologist
Most of these occupations require a four-year bachelor's degree, but some do not.
Degrees Related to Food Scientists and Technologist
- Bachelor in Agriculture, General
- Associate Degree Courses in Agriculture, General
- Masters Degree Courses in Agriculture, General
- Bachelor in International Agriculture
- Associate Degree Courses in International Agriculture
- Masters Degree Courses in International Agriculture
- Bachelor in Food Science
- Associate Degree Courses in Food Science
- Masters Degree Courses in Food Science
- Bachelor in Food Technology and Processing
- Associate Degree Courses in Food Technology and Processing
- Masters Degree Courses in Food Technology and Processing
- Bachelor in Brewing Science
- Associate Degree Courses in Brewing Science
- Masters Degree Courses in Brewing Science
- Bachelor in Viticulture and Enology
- Associate Degree Courses in Viticulture and Enology
- Masters Degree Courses in Viticulture and Enology
Training Required for Food Scientists and Technologist
Employees in these occupations usually need several years of work-related experience, on-the-job training, and/or vocational training.
Related Ocuupations
Some Ocuupations related to Food Scientists and Technologist in different industries are
- Food Science Technicians
- Animal Scientists
- Chemists
- Agricultural Technicians
- Soil and Plant Scientists
- Microbiologists
- Biofuels/Biodiesel Technology and Product Development Managers
- Quality Control Analysts
- Agricultural Engineers
- Chemical Engineers
- Agricultural Inspectors
- Chemical Technicians
- Biofuels Processing Technicians
- Industrial Ecologists
- Health and Safety Engineers, Except Mining Safety Engineers and Inspectors
- Graders and Sorters, Agricultural Products
- Biofuels Production Managers
- Industrial Engineering Technologists and Technicians
- Industrial Engineers
- Cooks, Restaurant
What Do Food Scientists and Technologist do?
- Test new products for flavor, texture, color, nutritional content, and adherence to government and industry standards.
- Check raw ingredients for maturity or stability for processing, and finished products for safety, quality, and nutritional value.
- Confer with process engineers, plant operators, flavor experts, and packaging and marketing specialists to resolve problems in product development.
- Evaluate food processing and storage operations and assist in the development of quality assurance programs for such operations.
- Study methods to improve aspects of foods, such as chemical composition, flavor, color, texture, nutritional value, and convenience.
- Study the structure and composition of food or the changes foods undergo in storage and processing.
- Develop new or improved ways of preserving, processing, packaging, storing, and delivering foods, using knowledge of chemistry, microbiology, and other sciences.
- Develop food standards and production specifications, safety and sanitary regulations, and waste management and water supply specifications.
- Demonstrate products to clients.
- Inspect food processing areas to ensure compliance with government regulations and standards for sanitation, safety, quality, and waste management.
- Seek substitutes for harmful or undesirable additives, such as nitrites.
- Develop new food items for production, based on consumer feedback.
- Stay up to date on new regulations and current events regarding food science by reviewing scientific literature.
Qualities of Good Food Scientists and Technologist
- Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
- Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
- Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
- Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
- Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
- Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
- Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
- Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
- Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
- Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
- Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
- Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
- Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
- Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
- Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
- Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
- Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
- Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
- Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
- Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
- Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
- Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
- Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
- Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
- Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
- Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
- Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
- Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
- Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
- Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
- Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
- Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
- Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
- Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
- Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
- Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
- Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
- Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
- Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
- Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
- Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
Tools Used by Food Scientists and Technologist
- Air sampling systems
- Amino acid analyzers
- Amylographs
- Anaerobic growth chambers
- Analytical balances
- Atomic absorption AA spectrometers
- Automatic diluters
- Autosamplers
- Bacterial identification systems
- Batch fryers
- Benchtop nephelometers
- Biological safety cabinets
- Bioreactors
- Blast freezers
- Carbon dioxide CO2 laboratory incubators
- Color difference meters
- Colorimeters
- Commercial microwave ovens
- Computerized calorimeters
- Conductivity meters
- Coulter counters
- Darkfield microscopes
- Dehydration equipment
- Dejuicers
- Desktop computers
- Differential refractometers
- Digital oscilloscopes
- Drum dryers
- Dynamic light scattering equipment
- Dynamic mechanical analyzers DMA
- Electronic laboratory balances
- Emulsifiers
- Epifluorescence microscopes
- Extractors
- Fermenting tanks
- Food choppers
- Food crushers
- Food dehydrators
- Food mixers
- Food slicers
- Fourier transform infrared FTIR spectrometers
- Fraction collectors
- Freeze drying equipment
- Fruit presses
- Gas chromatographs GC
- Gel electrophoresis equipment
- Glucose analyzers
- Griddles
- Grills
- Heat exchangers
- High pressure liquid chromatograph HPLC equipment
- High speed refrigerated centrifuges
- Homogenizers
- Ice cream freezers
- Induction cooktops
- Infrared IR spectrometers
- Ion chromatographs
- Jet cooking systems
- Laboratory lasers
- Laboratory mechanical convection ovens
- Laboratory mills
- Laboratory ovens
- Laboratory water baths
- Laptop computers
- Laser colony counters
- Macro kjeldahls
- Mass spectrometers
- Meat grinders
- Meat saws
- Melting point apparatus
- Membrane filtration systems
- Micro kjeldahls
- Microbial monitoring systems
- Microcentrifuges
- Muffle furnaces
- Nitrogen analyzers
- Orbital shaking water baths
- Oxygen analyzers
- Personal computers
- pH indicators
- Phase contrast microscopes
- Piston filling machines
- Plate heat exchangers
- Programmable incubators
- Pulper finishers
- Pulsifiers
- Ranges
- Reflectance spectrometers
- Refrigerated benchtop centrifuges
- Retort sterilization equipment
- Rheometers
- Roasting equipment
- Rotary evaporators
- Scanning electron microscopes SEM
- Scanning plate readers
- Specific gravity fat analyzers
- Spectrofluorimeters
- Spiral platers
- Steam autoclaves
- Steam blanchers
- Steam kettles
- Stomachers
- Strain testers
- Stuffers
- Thermal cyclers
- Thermal gravimetric analyzers
- Thermal processing equipment
- Torsion gelometers
- Tubular heat exchangers
- Ultraviolet UV spectrometers
- Vacuum packagers
- Viscometers
- Water activity meters
- X ray crystallography equipment
Technology Skills required for Food Scientists and Technologist
- BioDiscovery ImaGene
- HubSpot software
- Hypertext markup language HTML
- Image analysis software
- Insightful S-PLUS
- Marketo Marketing Automation
- MDS Analytical Technologies GenePix Pro
- Microsoft Access
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Office software
- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- Microsoft Word
- Oracle Eloqua
- PathogenTracker
- R
- SAP software
- Sensory Computer Systems SIMS
- STATISTICA
- Structured query language SQL
- Tableau
- U.S. Department of Agriculture USDA National Nutrient Database
- Word processing software