Food powders engineering, between knowhow and science: Constraints, stakes and opportunities

Food powders are presented and discussed according to food sciences specificities and according to powder engineering concepts. Food powders are very present in everyday life. They are generally obtained from agricultural raw materials by different processes such as fragmentation or spray-drying processes. Amongst the food products, the food powders are easy to preserve, transport, store, weight and process. They are used to bring specific functionalities (e.g. physicochemical stability, microbiological stability, organoleptic qualities and nutritional composition). As well as food products, food powders are complex systems that can be defined by a great dispersion in their properties caused by: (i) the complexity of the chemical composition of the agricultural raw materials; (ii) the heterogeneity of the native structures of the product; (iii) the reactivity under high temperature or water addition; (iv) the variability of the agricultural raw materials behavior. Food companies, equipment suppliers, and scientists became aware of the relevance of a global approach by integrating the food powders engineering approach (particles properties, powder reactivity, and powder processing) to the classical food sciences concepts. The aim of this article is to highlight the stakes and opportunities concerning food powder processing and particles properties. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.