Data Science & Engineering into Food Science: A novel Big Data Platform for Low Molecular Weight Gelators’ Behavioral Analysis
The objective of this article is to introduce a comprehensiveend-to-end solution aimed at enabling the applicationof state-of-the-art Data Science and Analyticmethodologies to a food science related problem. Theproblem refers to the automation of load, homogenization,complex processing and real-time accessibility tolow molecular-weight gelators (LMWGs) data to gaininsights into their assembly behavior, i.e. whether agel can be mixed with an appropriate solvent or not.Most of the work within the field of Colloidal andFood Science in relation to LMWGs have centered onidentifying adequate solvents that can generate stablegels and evaluating how the LMWG characteristics canaffect gelation. As a result, extensive databases havebeen methodically and manually registered, storingresults from different laboratory experiments. Thecomplexity of those databases, and the errors causedby manual data entry, can interfere with the analysisand visualization of relations and patterns, limiting theutility of the experimental work.Due to the above mentioned, we have proposed ascalable and flexible Big Data solution to enable theunification, homogenization and availability of the datathrough the application of tools and methodologies.This approach contributes to optimize data acquisitionduring LMWG research and reduce redundant data processingand analysis, while also enabling researchersto explore a wider range of testing conditions and pushforward the frontier in Food Science research.