What fuels a global food system? Packaging. Philip Nelson of Purdue University just won $250,000 World Food Prize for his work, which was announced Monday at the State Department. The Des Moines Register reports:

His achievements include perfecting heat sterilization and cooling methods for preserving many vegetable and fruit products without refrigeration, designing valves to keep micro-organisms out of storage containers and developing tanker ships for transporting orange juice around the globe.