11 July 2016
Food for Thought: Food Technology resources at the British Library
Do you need to explore molecular gastronomy or research the food industry or trends in the beverage business? Are you concerned with global food security, safety and supply? Are genetically modified foods a threat to our health and ecosystems or a benefit of biological research? What are the markets for different types of food and what is the impact of European regulation on these markets? These questions and many more can be explored by undertaking research at the British Library.
Our science reading rooms contain a strong food technology collection including books, journals, both print and electronic plus discovery tools such as the Food Science and Technology Abstracts (FSTA) database.
Electronic resources for research: our full set of databases are listed here and are accessible to registered readers on-site.
Accessing a world of knowledge: reader registration and pre-registration is quick and easy as outlined on our web site.
Explore the scope and depth of the British Library collections: digital books include topics such as “Developing food products for consumers with specific dietary needs" edited by Steve Osborn, Wayne Morley, Oxford, Woodhead Publishing, 2016, touching on the health aspects and books on wider cultural issues include examples such as “On the Town in New York : The Landmark History of Eating, Drinking, and Entertainments from the American Revolution to the Food Revolution" by Michael Batterberry and Ariane Batterberry, 2016.
Inter-disciplinary and multi-format collections: apart from the multidisciplinary links to the business, humanities and cultural aspects of food, the science collections cover packaging, preservation, agricultural production, food processing, microbiology, engineering and nutrition.
We hold the publications of the major food sector organisation such as the Institute of Food Science and Technology’s (IFST) “International Journal of Food Science and Technology" and the European Federation of Food Science and Technology’s (EFFST) journal entitled “Innovative Food Science and Emerging Technologies”.
The British Library offers a wide variety of formats and resources including the oral history food collections which have recently been made available online. These cover the history of food production from the start of the 20th Century and are a fantastic resource for food researchers and historians.
Our collection of historical patents are also a rich resource for understanding food technology and innovation. We offer amongst many other patent databases, the British granted patent specifications database, a document store that contains pdf copies of British patents from 1617-1899, and PDF copies of granted British patents from 1st January 2007. Although this database is searchable only by patent number, the reference staff can help with subject access using print patent indexes and up to five specifications per week can be downloaded for personal research. See the Business and IP Centre website for more information.
Sources of research in food standards and regulations can be found at the British Library where we collect these UK national publications, e.g. UK Food Standards Agency and international publications of key organisations such as the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations in our social science reading rooms.
Whet your appetite by visiting the British Library’s collections of food related resources, including recipes, it’s history, science and nutritional benefits.
Paul Allchin
Science Content Specialist