Welcome to Coffee, Decoded, the Specialty Coffee Association’s weekly column on science, research, and all things coffee knowledge.

PETER GIULIANO, the SCA's Senior Advisor for Scientific Communication writes about flavor chemistry in coffee: how can we understand the compounds behind what we taste and smell?

Welcome to Coffee, Decoded, the Specialty Coffee Association’s weekly column on science, research, and all things coffee knowledge.

PETER GIULIANO, the SCA's Senior Advisor for Scientific Communication, helps us understand the impact of roast color on coffee flavor

Welcome to Coffee, Decoded, the Specialty Coffee Association’s weekly column on science, research, and all things coffee knowledge.

PETER GIULIANO, the SCA's Senior Advisor for Scientific Communication, helps us understand the history of coffee roasting and why roast level matters so much to consumers.

Welcome to Coffee, Decoded, the Specialty Coffee Association’s weekly column on science, research, and all things coffee knowledge.

PETER GIULIANO, the SCA's Senior Advisor for Scientific Communication, helps us understand the mystery of coffee sweetness: How do we perceive it? What causes it? Can we smell it?

The Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) is proud to announce the release of its latest report, titled "Equitable Value Distribution Survey," marking a significant milestone in the continued effort to shape mindsets and business behaviors in order to foster equitable value distribution as a sustainability tool for the specialty coffee sector.

Welcome to Coffee, Decoded, the Specialty Coffee Association’s weekly column on science, research, and all things coffee knowledge.

PETER GIULIANO, the SCA's Senior Advisor for Scientific Communication, helps us understand the world of coffee species (plural!), their role in the history of coffee's cultivation and trade, and the exciting potential that coffee's diversity holds for the future. 

One of 25’s goals is to share academic research on coffee in plain language and in free-to-access formats. But we also believe that the coffee sector is full of stories and that these stories are important and influential. Research can sometimes feel abstract and theoretical, but we also know that there’s a story behind every project—even those conducted in a chemistry laboratory or by poring over data from scientific studies in something known as a global meta-analysis.

Peter Giuliano, SCA Senior Advisor of Science Communication, shares insights from research into the perspectives of coffee farm workers, and how this research has shaped knowledge building at the SCA.

Emily Pappo, Ph.D., a Postdoctoral Fellow with Smithsonian Bird Friendly Coffee & Cocoa, draws on a global meta-analysis to argue that while tree planting dominates current climate strategies in coffee, protecting existing biodiverse agroforestry systems should also be recognized as an effective climate and biodiversity solution. When incentivized, this approach can build shared value for producers and buyers.

The SCA’s Content Development Manager, Laurel Carmichael, speaks to researchers at the Hendon Coffee Lab about their chemistry lab that looks like a café, and about how they use electrochemistry and Design of Experiments to better understand the complexities of espresso extraction.

An interdisciplinary research team from Switzerland, Bolivia, and Colombia, led by Chahan Yeretzian, Nelson Gutiérrez Guzmán, and Johanna Jacobi, and including researchers Derly Lara, Daniel Castro, Sebastian Opitz, Sabine De Castelberg, Sergio Urioste, and Alvaro Irazoque, worked alongside coffee farmers, processors, and traders to examine which value chain structures improve farmer livelihoods in the Yungas of Bolivia and Huila, Colombia.

Dr. Aaron Davis, Senior Research Leader of Plant Resources and Head of Coffee Research at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, shares the history of Liberica coffee, recent genomic research that has redefined it as three distinct species, and how Liberica and Excelsa’s climate resilience and unique flavor profiles offer new opportunities for the specialty coffee sector.

Neuroscientist Dr. Fabiana Carvalho explores the specialty coffee sector's perceptions of canephora and how the development of the new Canephora Flavor Wheel could help cuppers better describe and value the species' sensory potential.

IARA NORONHA, Algrano's Content Team Lead, shares practical insights on how to manage business risks as a roaster. This article is based on a lecture given by Algrano CEO, RAPHAEL STUDER, at the Coffee Science and Education Summit at the Coffee Excellence Center, Zürich University of Applied Sciences.

DAPHNE ALLISON a trained therapist and former coffee professional, shares practical insights into how to build psychological safety in specialty coffee workplaces, and why it’s so important.

ELISA CRISCIONE, Founder & CEO of Digital Coffee Future, shares practical strategies for how specialty coffee companies can collect, manage, and visualize data in this two-part series. 

In this first instalment of a two-part series,ELISA CRISCIONE, Founder & CEO of Digital Coffee Future, shares practical strategies for how specialty coffee companies can collect, manage, and visualize data.

Back from Milan, BWT water+more can look back upon a successful HOST 2025. As the the 2022-2025 Official Water Filtration Sponsor for the World Barista Championship, the company provided perfect water on the world championship stage and captivated visitors to its own booth with an impressive presentation. 

As presented to SCA members on August 30, the SCA Board of Directors, led by President Pamela Chng, nominated a group of seven professionals from a pool of dozens who responded to our annual call for nominations made in June. As the number of candidates this year is equal to the number of open seats, there is no need to proceed with a voting process, and the SCA Board has confirmed the seven professionals listed below as members of the SCA Board of Directors, in accordance with Section 7.4(f) of the SCA Bylaws.

The coffee sector is in constant flux. Increasingly our definitions of consumer, creator, and producer are blurring. The way we drink coffee is changing, even how we define the term “coffee” itself.