Focus on Food

In its 25 years of publication, Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety has undergone some changes and has adjusted its scope to include new technologies. However, the journal's fundamental focus over the years has been on food science. The Institute of Food Technologists, which publishes this journal and the Journal of Food Science, is a scientific association centered on food. The plants, animals, fungi, algae, and bacteria that supply us with food also have components that could be used for non-food purposes. The editorial team acknowledges that some readers may be interested in non-food applications of food, particularly food processing by-products such as fruit peels, crustacean shells, or kombucha SCOBY. However, such discussions lie outside the journal's scope. As the Editor in Chief, I screen every manuscript submitted to the journal, and I often reject papers without review due to their scope. Manuscripts that discuss applications for food products and their by-products in cosmetics, textiles, animal feeds, compost, and other non-food uses are not eligible for consideration in the journal. Many submissions skirt the line between food and drugs. I rely on the well-known United States definition of a drug as a substance intended to “diagnose, cure, mitigate, treat, or prevent disease.” Sensors designed to detect the presence of pathogenic bacteria such as Listeria monocytogenes are not drugs, but encapsulated phytochemicals purported to treat or prevent diseases such as Type 2 diabetes could be considered a pharmaceutical application and thus outside the journal's scope. This situation is further complicated by the rise in medicine food homology in China, a concept based on Traditional Chinese Medicine. While food and medicinal plants may share common characteristics, manuscripts that discuss products with little or no history as human food will not be considered for peer review and subsequent publication in the journal. Discussions of food packaging materials should focus in detail on the effects of that material on food safety and quality, rather than solely on its physical and chemical characteristics. We are updating the journal's guidelines for authors to make these policies more transparent. Authors are always welcome to contact me through the journal to inquire about the suitability of a manuscript topic. Sincerely, Mary Ellen Camire, PhD, CFS Editor in Chief, Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety Professor, University of Maine