Professor Christophe Blecker graduated with a M.Sc. in chemical engineering in 1992 from Gembloux Agricultural University, and obtained his Ph.D. on the theme "Study on the Modification of Whey Functional Properties by Enzymatic Hydrolysis of its Residual Fat" in 1998 under the supervision of Professor Michel Paquot. His research interests concern food systems biophysics and formulation. He has authored 85 peerreviewed scientific papers and holds 4 patents. He is currently Professor at Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech (University of Lie `ge), head of the Department of Food Technology (60 people).

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Entomophagy is not well accepted in Western European populations but it is common in the world. In the future, populations from developed countries should adapt to other sources of animal proteins because traditional breeding of beef, poultry or pork will become unsustainable.This study was performed to assess the perception of entomophagy in the Belgian population. A slight neophobia was detected but people agreed to evaluate insect preparations. Various insect formulations (mealworms and house crickets) were prepared, and insects associated with known flavors and crispy textures were preferred. After a hedonic test, people seemed to be willing to eat and cook insects in the near future.The opportunity to introduce entomophagy in food habits of Western European populations was positively concluded. Integration of edible insects in human food is a potential solution to replace other animal protein sources in a much more sustainable development and will deserve more attention in the future. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONSThis study shows the edible insects' potential to become a usual food ingredient in Western European populations. Our results show that consumers are ready to buy and cook insects at home if they are able to associate them with familiar flavors. bs_bs_banner Journal of Sensory Studies

The present review gives an overview of the use of fluorescence spectroscopy (i.e., conventional, excitationemission matrix, and synchronous fluorescence) for determining changes in food products and their quality during technological process and storage. From the present review, it was shown that fluorescence spectroscopy is able to determine several properties (functional, composition, nutritional) without the use of chemical reagents. This is due to the use of chemometric tools (descriptive and predictive methods). The review focuses on the use of fluorescence spectroscopy for the determination of the quality of animal (i.e., dairy, meat, fish, and egg) and vegetable (oils, cereal, sugar, fruit, and vegetable) products as well as the identification of bacteria of agro-alimentary interest.

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This critical review article presents the current state of knowledge on isomalto-oligosaccharides, some well known functional oligosaccharides in Asia, to evaluate their potential as emergent prebiotics in the American and European functional food market. It includes first a unique inventory of the different families of compounds which have been considered as IMOs and their specific structure. A description has been given of the different production methods including the involved enzymes and their specific activities, the substrates, and the types of IMOs produced. Considering the structural complexity of IMO products, specific characterization methods are described, as well as purification methods which enable the body to get rid of digestible oligosaccharides. Finally, an extensive review of their techno-functional and nutritional properties enables placing IMOs inside the growing prebiotic market. This review is of particular interest considering that IMO commercialization in America and Europe is a topical subject due to the recent submission by Bioneutra Inc. (Canada) of a novel food file to the UK Food Standards Agency, as well as several patents for IMO production.

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