Flavor Release

For flavor to be perceived, it must be released from foods.  FREC has the ability to measure flavor release in multiple ways, including analysis of the breath and saliva of human subjects, and an artificial mouth.  These capabilities provide an understanding of how flavor is released from a product in real time during consumption and insight on how food composition and other parameters affect flavor release. We recently used these approaches to understand the impact of chewing gum formulation and physical properties on sweetener and flavor release. Our data demonstrated that polyol solubility and particle size altered the delivery of aroma and high-intensity sweeteners.  In other research, we defined ingredient interactions that impacted sodium release during mastication to provide a salt mitigation strategy that doesn’t compromise on salt taste.