Staff Profile:Dr Jane K. Parker

Name:

Dr Jane Parker

Job Title:

Senior Research Fellow and Flavour Centre Manager

Responsibilities:

The Flavour Centre

Areas of Interest:

I am the full-time manager of The Flavour Centre. This is a new venture which started at the beginning of 2008 to address needs of the food and flavour industries. The centre draws on the accumulated expertise of the flavour group to offer services in the area of flavour science. There are currently projects underway which involve flavour consultancy, proof of concept, contract research, analytical services and tailor-made training courses.

Over the past 12 years, I worked as a research fellow in the flavour chemistry group on research projects sponsored by major food companies. The main focus of this work was on flavour generated during the thermal processing of foods, and how the different pathways such as the Maillard reaction, the Strecker degradation and lipid degradation interact during and after processing. As a chemist, I am interested in the reaction mechanisms involved, and have used isotopically labelled starting materials in model food systems to elucidate the competing pathways which occur during the formation of flavour compounds, such as pyrazines. I have a particular interest in the formation of sulphur compounds during processing, particularly those responsible for meaty flavours, and how these sulphur compounds interact with components of the food matrix, such as protein.

Current work includes kinetic studies of flavour formation in the Maillard reaction using a meat system. We have generated a mathematical model, based on known reaction pathways, which can accurately explain and predict the formation of key flavour compounds. The ultimate aim of our work in Maillard chemistry is to understand how to control the Maillard reaction and manipulate the flavours generated in the end product.

Dynamic headspace extraction, steam distillation – solvent extraction, and solid phase microextraction (SPME) followed by GC-MS analysis are the main analytical techniques used our work. I have applied these techniques to look at flavour generation in many different foods, including cereals, meat, liver, fish, onions and garlic and potatoes.

Recently, we have developed a novel method to analyse more polar, less volatiles compounds which are known to contribute to the flavour of many foods, but are not extracted using traditional flavour analysis techniques. This new technique allows us to monitor compounds such as furaneol,^® nor-furaneol, maltol and other sugar-derived compounds in a range of compounds including meat, fish, tomatoes and strawberries.

GC-Olfactometry is widely used to help identify odour active compounds in foods and also to look for taints and off-notes. Correlation of chemical analysis with sensory analysis plays an important role in our approach to determining the flavour characteristics of foods.

Research groups / Centres:

Publications:

Low, Mei Yin; Parker, Jane K.; Mottram, Donald S. Mechanisms of Alkylpyrazine Formation in a Potato Model System Containing Added Glycine. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry (2007), 55(10), 4087-4094.

Methven, Lisa; Tsoukka, Maria; Oruna-Concha, Maria Jose; Parker, Jane K.; Mottram, Donald S. Influence of Sulfur Amino Acids on the Volatile and Non-volatile Components of Cooked Salmon (Salmo salar). Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry (2007), 55(4), 1427-1436.

Parker, Jane K.; Adamou, Margarita; Gough, Sarah J.; Mottram, Donald. S. Identification of polar compounds in a range of cooked meat and fish. Abstracts of Papers, 234th ACS National Meeting, Boston, MA, United States, August 19-23, 2007.

Low, Mei Yin; Koutsidis, Georgios; Parker, Jane K.; Elmore, J. Stephen; Dodson, Andrew T.; Mottram, Donald S. Effect of Citric Acid and Glycine Addition on Acrylamide and Flavor in a Potato Model System. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry (2006), 54(16), 5976-5983.

Parker, Jane K.; Arkoudi, Anna; Mottram, Donald S.; Dodson, A. T. Aroma formation in beef muscle and beef liver. Developments in Food Science (2006), 43 (Flavour Science), 335-338.

Mottram, Donald S.; Adams, Rachel L.; Parker, Jane K.; Brown, Helen M. The interaction of disulfide flavor compounds with proteins in model systems. Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology (2004), 542(Quality of Fresh and Processed Foods), 147-153.

Parker, Jane K.; Mottram, Donald S.; Adams, Rachel L. Interaction of sulphur-containing aroma compounds with proteins in both model systems and real food systems. Flavour Research at the Dawn of the Twenty-First Century, Proceedings of the Weurman Flavor Research Symposium, 10th, Beaune, France, June 25-28, 2002 (2003), 45-50.

Adams, Rachel L.; Mottram, Donald S.; Parker, Jane K.; Brown, Helen M. Flavor-Protein Binding: Disulfide Interchange Reactions between Ovalbumin and Volatile Disulfides. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry (2001), 49(9), 4333-4336.

Parker, Jane K.; Hassell, Glynis M. E.; Mottram, Donald S.; Guy, Robin C. E. Sensory and Instrumental Analyses of Volatiles Generated during the Extrusion Cooking of Oat Flours. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry (2000), 48(8), 3497-3506.

Mottram, Donald S.; Parker, Jane K.; Nobrega, Ian C. Interactions between sulfur-containing flavor compounds and proteins in foods. Book of Abstracts, 218th ACS National Meeting, New Orleans, Aug. 22-26 (1999).

Adams, Rachel L.; Mottram, Donald S.; Parker, Jane K. Use of SPME in the determination of the binding of sulfur-containing flavor compounds to proteins. Book of Abstracts, 218th ACS National Meeting, New Orleans, Aug. 22-26 (1999).

Qualifications:

B.Sc., Hons Chemistry, St Andrews
Ph.D. Physical Organic Chemistry, Cambridge
C.Chem. MRSC

other information

Lecturer on British Society of Flavourists (BSF) Course at Reading

Member of Organising Committee for BSF Course 2008

Invited speaker at Weurman flavour symposium 2002 and 2005 and American Chemical Society 2007

Reviewer for the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry