51 Starch structure-function relationships – From the lab to the “real world.” Louise Slade and Harry Levine. Cereal Science group, Nabisco Research, P.O. Box 1944, East Hanover, NJ 07936, USA.

At AACC Annual Meetings since 1984, we have presented results of our work on starch structure- function relationships, based on our “food polymer science” approach to studies of starch gelatinization, retrogradation, and annealing. We’ve used laboratory measurements, frequently made on experimental, benchtop model systems, to gain insights and increased understanding of starch-based ingredients, products, and processes. In “real world” industrial manufacturing settings, such starch-containing systems exist in time-dependent physical states far from equilibrium, where the kinetics of state transitions (e.g. the glass transition that controls gelatinization, retrogradation, and annealing), as influenced by plasticization by water and temperature (the effects of which are best illustrated by means of state diagrams), are more practical, relevant and informative than are theoretical considerations of equilibrium thermodynamic phases. In this talk, we’ll present material selected from among our recent studies on starch structure-function relationships, as related to cooking of whole-kernel corn for masa production, value-added processing of rice starches, flours and grains, functionality of potato and waxy maize starch ingredients in chip-like baked snacks, wheat starch gelatinization during cookie baking and retrogradation during shelf-life, and oil- roasting of peanuts and cashews.