Institute of Food Safety of the Chinese Academy of Inspection and Science: A scientific research pioneer in building China's food safety technology defense line

The people take food as the heaven, and food takes safety as the first

This team of only 30 people is not only an important scientific research team supporting the development of national food safety supervision, but also a pioneering team

Zhang Feng, vice president and chief expert of the Chinese Academy of Inspection and Quarantine, and team members worked together in the laboratory to study and discuss

Break through the bottleneck and build a strong barrier to food safety protection

"The CAS database contains 264 million chemical substances that could be illegally added or contaminated into food, but only more than 2,000 chemical hazards are included in the regulatory list

Zhang Feng said that the development of chemical harmful substances detection technology in food has two major technical needs and difficulties

It is understood that at present, there is no international report

Therefore, in view of the lack of unknown harmful substance detection technology, Zhang Feng led the research and development team of the food institute to start scientific research, successfully developed the detection and detection technology of unknown harmful substances in food, realized the breakthrough of harmful substance detection from "one by one" to "class-by-class", and initially solved the problem of unknown harmful substance detection; Developed real-time mass spectrometry detection devices and technologies for trace harmful substances in food, promoted food safety mass spectrometry detection devices and technologies to leapfrog to real-time, miniaturized and low-cost, and realized accurate on-site detection of food safety; It has developed omics-based risk determination and rapid toxicity evaluation technology for the whole chain of food, and has taken the lead in introducing "food omics into the field of risk determination and toxicity evaluation" in the world, and opened up a new direction

It is precisely by virtue of this kind of scientific research ability that dares to be the first and the best and enterprising, the food institute has broken through the three major technical bottlenecks of food safety detection technology: First, the technical bottleneck of food unknown risk detection, which systematically clarifies the soft ionization cleavage law of the mass spectrometry of harmful substances in food, and creates mass spectrometry detection and detection technology for unknown harmful substances in food; The second is the bottleneck of food safety traceability technology, which introduces food omics into the field of food safety traceability, develops the determination and risk traceability technology of over-processed food, promotes the progress of food traceability technology, and the research results are published in top journals of analytical chemistry such as Analytical Chemistry; The third is to quickly detect the bottleneck of core component research and development, integrate molecular imprinting technology with open mass spectrometry ion source, develop a highly selective nature spectral ion source, achieve a breakthrough in the independent intellectual property rights of key components of mass spectrometry, and the mass spectrometry ion source developed has applied for a national invention patent, and the research results have been published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, Food Chemistry and other top journals

"The mass spectrometry detection technology for new chemical hazards in food is still blank

"Benchmark against the world's first-class, strengthen cutting-edge exploration and forward-looking layout, and increase the intensity of

Scientific and technological detection It is incumbent upon us to adhere to the bottom line and ensure safety

It is understood that there are certain differences in food safety laws and standards between China and major trading countries, resulting in the risk of imported food is difficult to find, export food is vulnerable to trade technical barriers, there is an urgent need to timely capture regulatory changes, improve the accuracy, sensitivity and speed of detection, and accurately identify potential risks of detection technology

Zhang Feng, vice president and chief expert of the Chinese Academy of Inspection and Quarantine, and team members work in the laboratory

In 2017, a large number of foreign ambient milk was imported into China, and the National Certification and Accreditation Commission commissioned the Food Institute to carry out the safety risk identification

Overheating milk can prolong shelf life, but it can cause a certain loss

Zhang Feng said that conventional food safety testing is generally to go to the factory site to check, but for imported milk, it is impossible to verify the production process on the spot, and it is necessary to pass the final product test and analyze the unknown risks of the food processing process, which is a huge challenge

In order to unravel the mystery, Zhang Feng led the team to treat the laboratory as a battlefield, worked together, repeatedly conducted technical research, collected a large number of raw milk samples in the pasture, introduced food omics technology, built a safe identification model of hot-processed milk, screened out 5 kinds of overheating markers, and developed overheated milk determination technology

If the overheating of imported milk is a microcosm of the difficulty of food and serving the country's major strategic needs, then the EU porcini mushroom incident is a beautiful turnaround for

Boletus mushrooms are rare wild edible mushrooms and one of the important export products in

At that time, the European Union found nicotine from Yunnan porcini fungus, formulated extremely harsh temporary limit standards, and comprehensively removed China's edible mushroom products
.
In this case, the food is in danger and ordered to carry out emergency response to the emergency of porcini mushrooms exported from Yunnan to Europe
.

As a technical expert, Zhang Feng has represented China in negotiations
with the EU on many occasions.
Through cooperation with the Yunnan Technical Agency, the expert group confirmed that nicotine is an endogenous substance of porcini mushrooms, forcing the EU to revise the temporary limit for nicotine in porcini mushrooms, and the limit has been greatly increased
.
As a result, Yunnan Boletus has successfully resumed exports to the EU, thus solving the problem
of survival and development of millions of employees.

The successful resolution of crisis events is a common thing for the scientific research team of the Food Institute
.
In recent years, under the leadership of Zhang Feng, the Food Institute has successfully organized and responded to the "water and oil incident" in Taiwan, the "clenbuterol" incident in Hong Kong, and the "smelly salt" (odor salt) incident in the mainland, etc.
They not only provided timely technical support, but also successfully detected the "case" through scientific and technological means, so that these emergencies were effectively solved, and made outstanding contributions
to ensuring national food safety and promoting import and export trade.

In addition, in terms of supporting the development of national food safety supervision, the team also has a food standard working group of the Food Safety Sampling and Monitoring Secretariat of the State Administration of Market Regulation, which is responsible for organizing the standard revision of China's food supplementary inspection methods and food rapid testing methods, and puts forward the standard evaluation index system and methods, which makes positive contributions
to the development of China's food testing technology standardization.

Silent dedication to be a loyal defender of food safety defense line

The train runs fast, and it all depends on the head
.
Food testing has the characteristics of complex matrix, wide variety of harmful substances, traceability, etc.
, and the sample pretreatment process is cumbersome, the detection cycle is long, and the requirements for the operator's ability, quality, patience and other aspects are very high, and the improvement of scientific research ability can only be continuously refined and accumulated
in one experiment after another.
Therefore, Zhang Feng always leads by example, rushes to the front, works first, and often leads the team members to work overtime until late at night
.

Group photo of all team members of the Institute of Food Safety of the Chinese Academy of Inspection and Science

This scientific research team of 30 people, female comrades account for the majority, but it is in such a busy and demanding and high standard of the collective, they are not inferior to the work, along the way, there are too many hardships and not easy
.

For Zhang Feng and his team, working in the laboratory all day is a common thing, in their words, it is to choose food safety scientific research, but also to learn to deal with waiting and loneliness
.
Speaking of work and teamwork, Zhang Feng has a lot of topics and especially prefers the team
he leads.
He said that director Guo Wei, deputy director Xu Xiuli, Feng Feng and others have played an important role
in the management of the laboratory.
He believes that only by maximizing the "ability to collaborate" will the team have combat effectiveness
.
Zhang Feng also joked that he was better at doing ideological work
.
Usually, his words can make everyone suddenly cheerful
.

Dr.
Liu Tong, an associate researcher, is a young researcher who joined the Food Institute after returning to China
.
He said that he was fortunate to be a member of the Food Institute, to be able to participate in national, provincial and ministerial projects, and to obtain scientific and technological awards, which was inseparable from the guidance and help
of President Zhang Feng.
Dr.
Chen Fengming, an associate researcher with the same experience as Liu Tong, is also proud to be a member of the Food Institute and looks forward to making greater contributions
to the national food safety science and technology research.

On April 16, 2021, the Food Institute won the Advanced Collective Award
at the National Food Safety Work Advanced Collective and Advanced Individual Commendation Teleconference 。 In the past five years, the project "Key Technology Innovation and Application of Chemical Harmful Substances Detection in Food" led by Zhang Feng and his team has won the second prize of the National Science and Technology Progress Award; He has presided over more than 40 scientific research projects such as the EU Horizon 2020 project, the national "13th Five-Year Plan" key research and development project, and the national major scientific instrument and equipment development project; He has published more than 260 articles in domestic and foreign journals, edited 10 books, authorized 23 patents, formulated 9 national standards, trained 1 "Western Light" expert, more than 30 national technical backbones, and more than 60 graduate students.

Starlight does not ask passers-by, and the years pay off
.
This fruitful report card is the result of the whole team being enterprising and innovative, and they are a veritable "safe on the tip of the tongue" escort
.
When food safety emergencies come, they are duty-bound and charging ahead, and they are the scientific research pioneers
who have built the latest defense line of food safety protection with heart and soul.

(Fan Yongwei)

Editor-in-charge: Xu Zhenyue Review: Peng Zonglu