Why are scientists obsessed with 'sweets that have been mummified after eight years of expiration'?



Twinkie, a sweet with a creamy filling inside a sponge cake, has an urban legend that says, 'It won't hurt when the expiration date expires.' In October 2020, Colin Purrington, who lives in the United States, reported on Twitter that he found a Twinkie that had passed the expiration date for eight years in his basement, and scientists studying fungi began a full-scale investigation. I embarked on it.

Scientists Are Fascinated By An 8-Year-Old, Moldy Twinkie: NPR
https://www.npr.org/2020/10/15/923411578/a-disturbing-twinkie-that-has-so-far-defied-science

One day in October 2020, Purrington, who was having trouble with no sweets in his house, remembered that the Twinkie he bought in 2012 was in the basement. Since Hostess Brands, which manufactured Twinkie, went bankrupt in 2012, Purrington said that he bought it thinking that 'Twinkie may disappear forever as it is'. Twinkie has been reopened for manufacture and sale by the company that acquired Hostess Brands since 2013.

'When you don't have dessert at home, people are desperate,' says Purrington, who decided to take it out of the bag and eat it, even though Twinkie has passed its eight-year expiration date. Did. Officially, the expiration date of Twinkie is '45 days', but there is an urban legend that Twinkie does not rot even after the expiration date.

The image below is an 8-year-old Twinkie box that Purrington actually found in the basement.



'It tasted like old socks, though I haven't actually eaten old socks,' said Purrington, who spoke of an eight-year-old Twinkie that didn't look rotten at first glance. comment. Even though it looks okay, the Twinkie seems to be rotten, and Purrington said he spit out the Twinkie.

However, Purrington did not throw away all the Twinkies that were in the box, but decided to look into other Twinkies that were individually wrapped. In the photo below, the left is a cross section of an 8-year-old Twinkie, and the right is a cross section of a new Twinkie. You can see that the filling, which should have been white, has turned brown on the old Twinkie.



Also, some of them have large spots on the surface ...



Some Twinkies were crumpled and did not retain their original shape.



Brian Lovett and Matt Kasson of West Virginia University were interested in these photos posted by Purrington on Twitter. Lovett said the moment he saw this photo, Kasson thought he would want this Twinkie.

Kasson et al.'S laboratory is conducting research on fungi, and once experimented with how well mold grows with animal-shaped marshmallow peep . It was expected that it would be difficult for mold to grow on dry peep, but some molds decomposed the peep and grew well.

The spots on the surface of the Twinkie looked like a growth pattern typical of fungi, so they contacted Purrington and asked if they could send the Twinkie. 'Science is a communal sport,' said Purrington, who was happy to send Twinkie to West Virginia University.

When the Twinkie actually arrived in the lab, Lovett and colleagues noticed that the crumpled and mummified Twinkie packaging appeared to be sucked inside. This suggests that the fungus invaded the interior before the package was sealed and consumed the air or oxygen inside while the fungus decomposed the Twinkie. Lovett points out that the fungus that breaks down the Twinkie may have consumed the air inside and the bag approached a vacuum, resulting in a halt to fungus growth.



When Lovett and others opened the mummified Twinkie, they were prepared for a considerable stench, but thanks to the mummified inside, they did not stink at all. “This was a really nice surprise,” says Lovett.

The two performed a magnifying glass study and found that fungal spores were formed in both the large-spotted Twinkie and the mummified Twinkie. Two more people took a Twinkie sample using a bone marrow biopsy tool and found that the mummified Twinkie had a stiff outer wall, but the internal filling remained unexpectedly soft. .. 'It seems that the fungus was more interested in the outer cake than the inner filling,' Lovett commented.



When the collected sample was placed on a plate containing nutrients used for fungal culture and cultured, Cladosporium (black mold) grew from the Twinkie with spots. 'Cladosporium is one of the most common indoor molds in the world,' says Kasson.



On the other hand, it seems that the fungus has not grown from the mummified Twinkie as of October 15, 2020. 'Despite this wonderful and rare event we witnessed, there may be no living spores,' Lovett said, but from Twinkie, who has been mummified in various ways in the future. He is trying to cultivate live fungi.

In addition, Purrington's father was a type who did not care about the expiration date, while his mother was a type who cares about the expiration date properly, and Purrington who actually said the 8-year Twinkie said, 'Now. Then, the expiration date is closer to the mother. '

By the way, Twinkie is also famous for appearing frequently in American movies such as ' Die Hard ', ' Ghostbusters ', and ' Zombieland ', and can be purchased on Amazon at the time of writing the article.

Amazon.co.jp: Hostess Twinkies Hostess Twinkies 380g [Parallel imports]: Food, Beverage & Alcohol



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in Science,   Junk Food, Posted by log1h_ik