"Grounds for Sustainability" : Caffenol Research at the University of Massachusetts Amherst

Leidolf · Mar 24, 2023

bendytwin said:
Dear friends and colleagues,

Briefly, before I describe the research in the title of this post: I want to express my eternal thanks to so many here who, without being otherwise aware of it, I owe a debt of gratitude for your having contributed to 15+ years of posts (first from APUG / Photo.net and now here) that made my academic work possible. I've lost count of how many times I came looking for an odd answer and found it. I'm currently teaching 16mm analog film production at UMass Amherst, having brought it back to life after many years on hiatus. Before that, I spent a decade doing my PhD on the chemical, mechanical, and optical aspects of photographic and cinematographic technology, focusing on two movements (International Pictorialism and French New Wave cinema) as case studies. Many of you are my heroes without knowing it (RIP Ron Mowrey) -- thank you all for blessing members such as myself who come here to the well of photographic knowledge to draw metaphorical water.

So to share some excitement: together with a colleague in Chemistry, I'm doing interdisciplinary research on coffee and phenol-based photographic developers. This year we received a $10,000 seed grant from UMass Amherst's School of Earth and Sustainability (which funded our purchase of a couple cases of 16mm Tri-X for our students) in order to process student film in Caffenol made from leftover dining hall coffee and grounds and in parallel do HPLC on it to assess caffeic acid content, which is ostensibly one of the primary active ingredients when used as a developer. In connection with this effort, we're working with the National Science Foundation's Innovation Corps to talk with everyone from darkroom managers to end-users to suppliers like Photographer's Formulary about interest in eco-friendly, coffee-based developer.

As we start to make a list of contacts, please reply or message me, as we'd love to be in correspondence with anyone interested here, including:
1) end-users interested in sustainable film development, and
2) chemists and others with experience with regard to the chemistry of photography

Since I am but a humble practitioner, that second category will be a big help to my colleague in Chemistry -- I know Caffenol works, but I wouldn't be able to write out a photographic oxidation-reduction reaction without pulling out Mees!

I'm of course a member of the various FB developing groups and am in the middle of writing the founders of Caffenol.org about this effort. Just got off the phone with Dr. Scott Williams from RIT who to my knowledge did some of the first publicly-available university work on coffee development in 1995. Very excited to be pushing forward with this project!

David Bendiksen

portfolio — David Bendiksen

www.davidbendiksen.com

Visiting Filmmaker, Film Studies Program
University of Massachusetts Amherst

Wow a $10 000 grant!
Let me offer BARKANOL. Fetch about 200 grams og dried out frozen twigs in the vinter og early spring. Put them trough a goffe grinder, and boil them i hot water.
This brings out stuff like what reacts in Coffenol, the coffee ingredient and will when treated with washing soda and then have ascorbic acid added, just like Coffenol produce a quite similar developer. Easy peasy, and 10000 dollar saved.

Recycled coffe grinds from coffe machines, if I understand you right will require a lot more stuff than the original pulver coffe, and most brands of those works equally as long as it is real coffe, in my experience.

However my kitchen bench top research on coffenol is some 10-15 years past, I have most of it published in a Blog together with other ideas, like Liptonol where strong tea is exchanged for the coffe, it works similarly without quite the nasty smell.

Ascorbate-developers

Dedicated to various alternative processes for developing photograpic film. Focuses on but not reserved to Kaffenol developers.

ascorbate-developers.blogspot.com

And btw the 3 authors in the blog concluded that phenidone, or Dimenzione-S was abetter way to go than ascorbates, more stable, finer grain, and lots of reliable recipes......
My personal conclusion was trusty D-76 and Rodinal, even homemade Rodinal, was perfect for 6x6 and 6x9 negatives.

BradS · Mar 24, 2023

Sounds like fun research.

What is meant by 'sustainable' ?

relistan · Mar 25, 2023

Essentially caffenol is a range of organic molecules that contain a catechol moiety and behaves more or less like catechol. It is superadditive with the same developing agents that catechol is superadditive with.

Chlorogenic acid and quercetin are two of these molecules in coffee. The rest are listed here https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00217-019-03388-9/tables/1

Some of us played with quercetin and showed that it behaves like catechol. Starting from here https://www.photrio.com/forum/threa...ops-like-pyrogallol.82705/page-4#post-2630597

First photographic results were here:

Quercetin Chalcone develops like Pyrogallol

Patented in 1999, Quercetin Chalcone (QuCh) is sold in health supplement capsules.Capsules of Quercetone contain 250mg QuCh and capsules of Quercenase (which I ordered by mistake) contain 250mg QuCh and 100 mg Bromelain.I doubt the Bromelain in the capsules I used had any effect but cannot be...

www.photrio.com

Using a caffenol-like formula with regular quercetin here:

https://www.photrio.com/forum/threads/quercetin-chalcone-develops-like-pyrogallol.82705/post-2635606

koraks · Mar 25, 2023

Leidolf said:
asy peasy, and 10000 dollar saved.

Replies like these constitute a fundamental misunderstanding what academic research is for. Evidently, if the only reason for this project was to find an affordable developer for film, nobody would have even bothered beginning to write a proposal for it, let alone one being funded. Projects like these revolve around figuring out things like:
* How can we manage interdisciplinary innovation projects in practical terms, and prevent them from remaining stuck within one of the many silos they emerge in?
* What are sensible ways to balance costs and benefits, both financial and otherwise, that emerge in totally different places and that are of sometimes difficult to compare nature?
Questions like "does this developer actually work" are likely of a secondary nature, and even the question of "what is the underlying chemistry at work here" is likely just a minor aspect of the project altogether.

It's very easy to shoot down a project like this if you're not familiar with what academic research involves in practice. If the latter is the case, I'd suggest instead of disqualifying or ridiculing it, to reformulate your criticism in the form of a question, such as "how come that a seemingly simple question about using coffee grounds as a developer requires a $10k project? What are the activities in such a research project and how do they contribute to what kind of new knowledge generated?" That way, you might actually learn something, and you'd still put the researchers in a position where they have to do their best to justify the resources absorbed by their project.

Alan Johnson · Mar 25, 2023

koraks said:
Replies like these constitute a fundamental misunderstanding what academic research is for. Evidently, if the only reason for this project was to find an affordable developer for film, nobody would have even bothered beginning to write a proposal for it, let alone one being funded. Projects like these revolve around figuring out things like:
* How can we manage interdisciplinary innovation projects in practical terms, and prevent them from remaining stuck within one of the many silos they emerge in?
* What are sensible ways to balance costs and benefits, both financial and otherwise, that emerge in totally different places and that are of sometimes difficult to compare nature?
Questions like "does this developer actually work" are likely of a secondary nature, and even the question of "what is the underlying chemistry at work here" is likely just a minor aspect of the project altogether.

It's very easy to shoot down a project like this if you're not familiar with what academic research involves in practice. If the latter is the case, I'd suggest instead of disqualifying or ridiculing it, to reformulate your criticism in the form of a question, such as "how come that a seemingly simple question about using coffee grounds as a developer requires a $10k project? What are the activities in such a research project and how do they contribute to what kind of new knowledge generated?" That way, you might actually learn something, and you'd still put the researchers in a position where they have to do their best to justify the resources absorbed by their project.

Whose project is this?
This re-write bears little resemblance to the original, which requests input on matters including chemistry.

koraks · Mar 25, 2023

Alan Johnson said:
matters including chemistry.

I didn't purport it's not part of it. I'm pointing out it doesn't have to be the prime or only purpose of the project, based on the hundreds of similar projects I've seen pass by or have been involved in, in my academic career, revolving around managing innovation.

Keywords that I trigger on, for instance, are the interviews that are planned with "everyone from darkroom managers to end-users to suppliers like Photographer's Formulary about interest in eco-friendly, coffee-based developer." These interviews would contribute marginally (if, at all) to the creation of knowledge within the domain of chemistry. On the other hand, they are a logical activity if the aim is to investigate how an innovation can be adopted by the market. As such, they're essential in understanding how knowledge that originates in the realm of chemistry finds its way into a (possibly) viable product and what the factors contributing to the adoption of such a product would be.

Alan Johnson · Mar 25, 2023

The surprising thing about the chemistry was that, whilst caffeic acid is widely credited on the internet with being the probable developing agent, the table posted by @relistan shows [if it is correct] that roasted beans contain very little of it:

The content of polyphenols in coffee beans as roasting, origin and storage effect - European Food Research and Technology

Coffee, one of the most popular beverages in the world, contains many bioactive compounds. The aim of this study was a comparative evaluation of the content of bioactive compounds in organic and conventional coffee (Coffea arabica) originating from Brazil during 12 months storage. The content of...

link.springer.com

As for the main constituent, chlorogenic acids, a bit of digging showed that there are a lot of them.
I don't remember if it was concluded that one of the constituents listed in the table, or a derivative of one or more of them was responsible for the development. Anyhow it does seem that it would be quite an expensive process to figure out.

pentaxuser · Mar 25, 2023

This thread has got only got 31 posts in 6 months and like most threads not all posts are supportive. Given it is about sustainability and that seems the new "buzz word" connected with saving the Earth I wonder if this mirrors the "real world's" interest in such matters?

I am just as bad. I skimmed over the opening post months ago and have only bothered to read the thread again now.

This lack of interest may bode badly for us all, especially our grand and great grandkids.

Just a thought

pentaxuser

Andrew O'Neill · Mar 25, 2023

bendytwin said:
A heartfelt thank-you to everyone for your enthusiasm and replies these past few months -- sorry for not being present here in discussion; I've just been busy with the teaching semester across the three colleges I'm at right now. My colleague in Chemistry recently got in the column and standards needed for analysis, so she'll be putting in some work on it this semester and I'll try to report back with results as we get them.

Looking forward to hearing your results!

Kino · Mar 25, 2023

Frankly, I welcome any sort of formal investigation into film developers that has successfully obtained funding from a University.

At the very least, it shows some engagement and interest in the subject...

mshchem · Mar 25, 2023

Need to study how to get rid of plastic. Single use plastic.

Maybe go back to the cool metal film canisters.

bendytwin · Jun 20, 2023

Short update: just met with our small team to go over analysis from the past semester. I have to prepare a report for the grant, and hopefully by summer's end can share it here. Our chemistry department was intrepid and spent good hours and labor on this, but I'm told there was some difficulty in obtaining consistent results even from the same coffee samples. We'll be continuing in the Fall semester as well.

pentaxuser · Jun 20, 2023

bendytwin said:
Short update: just met with our small team to go over analysis from the past semester. I have to prepare a report for the grant, and hopefully by summer's end can share it here.

Sharing the report that's great but when can you share the $10,000 grant between us as well? I know I only have posted once but it was a wide ranging and very philosophical post so I hope that is taken into consideration in determining each of our percentages

pentaxuser

koraks · Jun 20, 2023

@pentaxuser I'm sure they can find a way to let you share in the total cost of the research project. If you give them your address, they'll send you the invoice.

MattKing · Jun 20, 2023

I’m guessing that the team spent many long hours working on this, supported by way too much coffee consumption!

pentaxuser · Jun 20, 2023

koraks said:
@pentaxuser I'm sure they can find a way to let you share in the total cost of the research project. If you give them your address, they'll send you the invoice.

I might just do that on the day I can spot a colour crossover at one thousand yards downwind as the old big game hunters on the Serengeti used to say

pentaxuser

"Grounds for Sustainability" : Caffenol Research at the University of Massachusetts Amherst

Leidolf

portfolio — David Bendiksen

Ascorbate-developers

BradS

relistan

Quercetin Chalcone develops like Pyrogallol

koraks

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Alan Johnson

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Alan Johnson

The content of polyphenols in coffee beans as roasting, origin and storage effect - European Food Research and Technology

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Kino

mshchem

bendytwin

pentaxuser

koraks

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MattKing

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pentaxuser

"Grounds for Sustainability" : Caffenol Research at the University of Massachusetts Amherst

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