ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses biotechnological aspects of the flavour and fragrance industry, concentrating on new developments that are rapidly changing the types of flavours and fragrances used, and their applications. Current technical knowledge and new developments are surveyed to provide insight into the biochemical basis of flavours and fragrances and to show how biotechnology is providing new opportunities for the industry with product quality and cost as the crucial goals. The flavour and fragrance industry is thus characterised by the use of a very large number of raw materials to generate a wide range of products. Consequently, each product is invariably a very complex mixture of different chemicals which often interact with one another. Typically, business is divided approximately equally between flavours, fragrance materials and essential oils and aroma chemicals. Flavour and fragrance materials can be classed as natural, nature-identical, and synthetic or artificial.
