Starch: Achievements in Understanding of Structure and Functionality

The history of starches and investigations of starch containing raw materials goes back many centuries, steady progress in the understanding of processing and modification processes of starches awaits further elucidation. Fortunately, the cluster model of native starch granules is now generally accepted. The remaining problems concerning physics and chemistry, biochemistry and genetics, and processing and modification of starches are dealt with annually at different conferences and symposiums by experts in various fields. The numerous questions concerning structural organisation of starch granules, their behaviour in different thermodynamic conditions (temperature, water content, pressure) during biosynthesis and in different solvents at processing of both starch and starch containing raw material deserve further study because they are not yet entirely understood.