Research at Null Set Labs

Food Systems and Access

Research and tools for nutritional quality, community food systems, and the economics of food access.

The lab studies what people eat and how food reaches them, and builds tools that food banks and community programs can actually use.

Pantry Dashboard · public for pilots
NutriScan · concept in preparation
Food Bank Efficiency · research in preparation
Projects

Where the community food research is happening.

How this page is organized
A B C D E
NutriScan
In Preparation

Multi-source nutritional quality classifier built on Nutri-Score, NOVA, and the UK FSA traffic-light system.

food.nullsetlabs.org/nutriscan
Community Food Bank Efficiency
In Preparation

Operational research on local food bank workflows, demand patterns, and economic disparities in food access. Public deliverable: the Pantry Dashboard.

food.nullsetlabs.org/community-food-bank
Why this research

Where the food work is showing up.

In the pantry
Patterns that went unread.

A food bank's records are often wide, sparse spreadsheets that no one has time to read closely. The Pantry Dashboard turns those into capacity and demand patterns staff can act on, and it is in community pilot use now.

On the label
Nutrition scored consistently.

Front-of-pack scores disagree across systems and under-represent some diets. NutriScan brings published methods such as Nutri-Score, NOVA, and FSA traffic lights into one comparison, so a product's nutritional picture is easier to read.

In the research
Operations, studied carefully.

Community Food Bank Efficiency studies workflows, demand patterns, and disparities in access. The work is in preparation, built on the same data the Pantry Dashboard already puts to use.