George Elton
Scientist and government adviser who helped end the peasouper and revolutionise bread production
GEORGE ELTON, who has died aged 93, was a scientist who played an important role in research that led to the elimination of the peasouper in British cities and the development of modern bread-baking methods; later he served as chief scientific adviser at the former Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food (Maff).
He was an expert in colloids, which are mixtures in which the insoluble particles of one substance are suspended within another substance, for example oil in water (emulsions), air in water (foams) and water in air (fogs).
In the early 1950s, after a series of terrible smogs in London, Elton became involved in research aimed at reducing their impact and in 1954 the Ministry of Supply appointed him director of a newly formed Fog Research Unit in Battersea. His work on the basic characteristics of fog informed the formulation of the Clean Air Act of 1956 and the introduction of smoke-free zones, which brought an end to the peasouper.
In 1957 Elton was appointed director of research and chief executive of the British Baking Industries Research Association (BBIRA) in Chorleywood, with a brief to research how the breadbaking process might be improved to allow greater use of homegrown wheat. With colleagues, Elton led research on the fundamental properties of wheat flour components and studied the basic reactions that occur during the baking process.
In 1961 he proposed what became known as the Chorleywood Bread Process (CBP), a method of producing quickripened bread dough that allows the use of lower-protein wheats and drastically reduces processing time.
Within a few years the CBP had been adopted by virtually every large-scale baker in Britain, leading to the much greater use of home-grown wheat, and a reduction in the import bill for higher protein Canadian and American wheats estimated at £5 billion in the first 30 years.
Although the process has often been blamed for producing industrialised “cotton wool” bread with extensive use of additives, CBP is still used in more than 80 per cent of factory-produced bread in Britain and is also often used by smaller bakers who shape by hand pre-mixed dough. In 1966 BBIRA was recognised in the first list of the Queen’s Awards to Industry.
As chief scientific adviser at Maff, from 1971 to 1985, Elton dealt with several public scares over food contamination. The discovery in 1972 that the lead content in baby food was two to three times higher than the average content of food eaten by adults (because of lead solder used in the can-making process) led to the withdrawal from sale of all canned baby foods and their replacement with glass jars or cans with tin-based solder.
He was also involved in research on fungal toxins, including dangerous aflatoxins (substances derived from the mould
Aspergillus flavus which had been found in various food products), which led to the introduction by the EEC, US and Canada of a regulatory limit of 30 parts per billion (ppb), to be enforced via checks on imports.
This led to Elton’s first meeting with the new prime minister Margaret Thatcher, shortly after a Commonwealth Conference at which India’s prime minister Indira Gandhi had accused Britain of discriminating against Indian exports such as peanuts.
As Elton recalled in a short memoir, “Mrs Thatcher said that if this was true, it was unforgivable, and who had advised the Government on this, implying that the person concerned should have his brains tested. Fortunately her first degree had been in Chemistry at Oxford, and as I explained the problem … she became quite interested. When I told her that about half of Indian shipments were over the limit of 30 ppb, quite a few were over 100 ppb, and one had been 440 ppb, she accepted that what we were doing was necessary.”
George Alfred Hugh Elton was born at Wimbledon on February 27 1925 and educated on a scholarship at Sutton County School, a grammar school, where he developed an interest in science. After leaving school aged 15, he worked briefly for a coal merchant and in 1941 started weekend classes at Kingston Technical College, where he got a job as an assistant in the biology laboratory.
Called up in 1942, he applied for selection as RAF aircrew but was put on “deferred service” for up to 18 months. By that time, however, he had acquired a London University BSC and was called up instead into the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. He was posted to work on the Tube Alloy Project (which was closely linked to the Manhattan Project) under WH Banks, on the gaseous diffusion of uranium isotopes, an important part of the work that led to the atom bomb.
Elton would later take a PHD in colloidal science at Battersea Polytechnic, where he eventually became a senior lecturer, before becoming involved in fog research. After three years as director and chief executive of the Flour Milling and Baking Research Association, he joined Maff as chief scientist.
Elton was passionate about golf, playing up to three times a week at Beaconsfield Golf Club into his late 80s. He supported Arsenal FC and was a member of MCC, having played cricket for Chorleywood.
George Elton was appointed CB in 1983. In 1951 he married Theodora Kingham, who died in 2009. He is survived by their two daughters.
George Elton, born February 27 1925, died June 7 2018