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It has long been known that the fats we consume in our diet can have an impact on our health. However, their implications on cell differentiation has not previously been understood. We spoke to Professor Ilya Levental about his group's exciting work in this field, the role of lipidomics and how this may affect the future of healthcare.

Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy is a non-destructive analytical technique that enables interrogation of the nature and structure of organic compounds. It is proving an invaluable tool in food provenance investigation and recent advances to improve analysis speed and sensitivity look set to continue this trend.

Mass spectrometry has evolved as a prevailing technique for both the characterization of biotherapeutics and identification of protein variants and post-translational modifications.

Since its origins in the 1960s, the biosensors field has grown to encompass a wide range of sensors, from enzyme-based to immunosensors to DNA biosensors. Along with this, a diverse set of applications have flourished, with biosensors finding roles in food safety, medical diagnostics, and environmental analysis to name just a few.

An interdisciplinary team of researchers recently demonstrated the role that H. pylori plays in gastric stem cell renewal. We spoke to lead author, Professor Thomas Meyer from the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology, to learn more about the study and its wider implications for the future diagnosis and treatment of stomach cancer.

Food fraud takes many forms, including adulteration, package tampering, outright counterfeiting of products or ingredients, mislabeling, intentional use of illegal or substandard ingredients, manufacturing shortcuts to lower production costs, and many others. Thanks to modern technology, detecting food fraud is mostly an analytical chemistry exercise, with choice of methodology depending on the quality attribute the food detective is looking for.

Today’s laboratories look very different to ten years ago, but what about ten years from now? When it comes to laboratory evolution, great strides have been made over the past decade, and further technological advancements are sure to bring us even closer to a fully automated ‘intelligent lab of the future’.

Aflatoxins have been an issue in food and feed since the 1970’s, but the first global effort to regulate them took place in 2003. Aflatoxin B1 is by far the most prevalent and potent sub-type. Accordingly, maximum levels for B1 are set lower than total aflatoxin levels which highlights the need to test these two measures independently.

Medicine has been moving away from a "one-size-fits-all" approach towards predictive, preventive and treatment strategies tailored to the individual - precision medicine. Quantitative proteomics is playing an important part in this process but there are still some areas in which improvements must be seen before assays are likely to be routinely available to clinicians and patients.

An innovative, low-cost diagnostic test that identifies patients at risk of myocardial infarction (MI) could enhance the treatment of patients at emergency departments worldwide.