Food Science

3 credit course. Offered Spring. General overview and principles; food constituents and properties; quality and safety; preservation methods; processing animal and plant products.

3 credit course. Offered Summer. The field of Sensory and Consumer Science is primarily focused on responses of consumers to food products and non-food fast-moving consumer goods (e.g., shampoo). These responses may be sensory/perceptual (i.e., how sweet, how bitter, how smooth) or affective (i.e., liking/preference), with the assumption that the former generally drives the later. Numerous tools have been developed by sensory practitioners over the last 70 years, with additional influences from experimental psychology. The course also addresses contemporary research on pedagogy that indicates applied statistics are best taught in context to the field in which students will apply the statistical concepts. Here, students will gain practice applying introductory statistical topics (t-tests, Analysis of Variance, etc.) to sensory and consumer data collected from human participants.

3 credit course. The goal of this course is to provide food industry professionals with information to assist them in recognizing and applying measures to prevent intentional contamination of the food supply.