Our next adventure takes us to Bern, Switzerland, to the nation's center of excellence for agricultural research—Agroscope. The institute prides itself on researching and contributing to a high-quality, sustainable food sector through nutrition and agricultural science. This rings especially true for its signature products, including the famous wheels of Emmental cheese. Only one question remains: Where have all the holes gone?

A simple question, but one worth its cheesy weight in gold. Different markets prefer different hole sizes in their cheese. For example, commercial manufacturers of sliced cheese prefer smaller holes in greater numbers, while other consumers favor walnut-sized holes. Being able to control the size and prevalence of these holes has quite literally become a billion-dollar challenge—one that becomes difficult to solve if the holes keep vanishing without a trace.

There are a few theories about what caused the holes to begin with, such as carbon dioxide bubbles released by bacteria, or that holes would occur in certain areas based on "crystallization patterns" that rely on small irregularities to trigger eye formation. Whatever the reason, cheese holes have been plaguing agricultural researchers for decades. It was only in recent years that researchers were able to use non-destructive testing methods on cheese to "poke holes" in the original theory and gain a better understanding of what, exactly, was happening beneath the surface.

Using the Porosity/Inclusion Analysis (PIA) module of the software, the team was able to visualize the formation of holes along with each hole's position, diameter, and volume. Occasionally, holes would connect and even merge; in this case, foam/powder analysis (FPA) can account for every individual hole in each growth stage—even after they overlap—as opposed to PIA, which is mainly useful for gaining statistical information on combined holes. In the end, the team added the volumes of individual holes to determine the overall relative hole percentage of each wheel.

While they were keeping track of hole behavior in the wheels, the team discovered something new: the absence of holes greatly increased the risk of crack formation in the cheese! Without cheese holes, high CO2 pressure causes the cheese to crack in the more advanced stages of maturity, which leads to a steady loss in product quality over time.

The golden rule to a porosity/inclusion analysis—with only few exceptions—is to perform a surface determination. Because the surface is generally the region of analysis, this ensures that each hole is considered part of the surface. Some holes, as pictured at Day 130, are composed of brighter, low-contrast gray values, which made it less than optimal for defining a global tolerance for the entire data set. A quick VGEasyPore analysis allowed us to examine local contrasts and account for both dark and light holes.

As part of the porosity/inclusion analysis, we can apply directional variability to visualize how holes are distributed in a specified direction.

An additional option allows us to create an integration mesh that consists of sectors—or slices in the cheese wheel—and calculate the average porosity for each individual sector.

Through non-destructive testing and CT image analysis, researchers were able to confirm one of their running theories: it was all in the hay. While bacteria releases carbon dioxide, it still needs a small irregularity—like a particle of hay—to latch onto and gather around, forming larger bubbles. Closer microscopic investigation revealed that the capillary structures present in the hay functioned as optimal "seed points"; during the warm cheese-forming process, air trapped in the capillaries would expand and break free, attracting the carbon dioxide  gas. By adding trace amounts of hay particles, researchers could therefore gain better control over hole formation in cheese.

For a more detailed, in-depth look into the process of eye formation in cheese, click here!

Daniel Wechsler, project manager at Agroscope, would like to apply CT technology beyond the scope of cheese. "The successful non-destructive testing of hole formation in cheese using CT has totally convinced us. We can definitely imagine using CT and Volume Graphics software in other areas of food research that Agroscope is active in," he says.

Against the backdrop of technological advancements, it makes sense. In the past, milk was acquired from cows in green pastures, but this quaint and rustic image has all but disappeared from the dairy industry. The transition from age-old milking methods in barns to fully automated, industrial milking systems has made milk much cleaner—hay and other "dirt particles" do not make it into the final product. In other words, the culprit behind the missing holes is the milk itself: it's simply too clean.

Every now and then, you'll come across data sets that are just asking to be explored. This is one of them. Why resist the temptation?

Behold, a single cheese wheel. Let your imagination run wild with pop-colored cheese holes!

If you're already playing with food (in the purely virtual sense, of course), we recommend checking out the "scale" tab in the transform tool, which allows you to resize ROIs in the easiest way possible.