Frank Gunstone, who recently was appointed the Dean Helen LeBaron Hilton Endowed Chair in the College of Family and Consumer Sciences, will give a lecture tonight titled “Feeding the Favored: Tailor-Made Fats.”

The lecture will deal with the fat composition found in food. Gunstone plans to define both the nutritional and physical properties of fat composition, as well as the various types of fat modification.

“Nature doesn’t provide perfect fat,” Gunstone said. “It needs to be modified.”

Various methods have been used to modify fat, including genetic modification and wild plant domestication for fatty-acid composition.

Although the United States has not approved the method, much of the world has begun to research the possibility of using micro-organisms to produce lipids instead of plants. This helps to take the focus off the widespread use of genetic modification, which many countries reject.

“Europeans don’t trust the regulatory authorities as much as Americans. As a community, we are more conservative, less risk-taking,” Gunstone said.. “Scientists have been at fault for not explaining what they are doing and why.”

Gunstone said scientists need to take the time to explain to the public, in common terms, what their research means and what changes it can potentially make.

During his six-week stay, Gunstone will be teaching graduate and departmental seminars in food science and human nutrition, said Suzanne Hendrich, associate dean of the College of Family and Consumer Sciences.

Hendrich said the honor of chair is awarded to “a pre-eminent scholar whose work relates to Family and Consumer Sciences.”

Gunstone, who is a retired professor of organic chemistry at St. Andrew’s University in Scotland, was awarded the position because he is “one of the most influential lipid chemists in the world, and fats are a major area in food science,” Hendrich said.

His lecture will be held tonight at 8 in the Molecular Biology Building Auditorium. It is free and open to the public.