Underutilized and unconventional starches: Why should we care?

Background: Starch is a major component of our diet. It is also a useful and versatile ingredient in many food and nonfood uses. The main starch sources include maize, potato, cassava, and wheat. The starches from these sources represent the most studied and the most used starches for both industry and academia. Recently, there has been increasing research focusing on underutilized, nonconventional and novel starches from many different crops. There has been discussion on why we should spend effort in studying these novel starches. Scope and approach: This commentary illustrates the rationale of exploring unconventional starches using case studies. The examples used may represent typical cases for each reason. A limited number of starch examples have been used, though there can be many other unconventional starches not mentioned here. How the underutilized starches may complement the common starches for diverse food and nonfood applications is discussed. Key findings and conclusions: The rationale of exploiting these underutilized starches relates to sustainable and green production, waste and by-products utilization, local availability, demand of novel experiences from consumers, cultural and social significance, and technological advantages over the common starches. Future studies should be focused on the comparison between underutilized starches and the common starches to show if there are any technological advantages of the former.