Scientists Find Easy Trick to Make the Perfect Coffee Grounds

Brewing the perfect cup of coffee starts with the grounds. If you're looking to ensure this part of the process results in the best grounds, scientists at the University of Oregon have you covered.

A new study published in the Matter journal affirmed the effectiveness of one barista industry secret in particular. By spraying a spritz of water on beans before grinding them, coffee drinkers can reduce static in the beans, thereby preventing grounds from sticking to the sides of the grinder. As an added benefit, it also creates a stronger-tasting shot of espresso.

"If you’re going to be grinding whole-bean coffee, adding a small amount of water to those whole beans before you grind them will result in the coffee being more accessible when you brew it,” study author Christopher Hendon told The Washington Post.

Josh Méndez Harper, a volcanologist and lead author on the study, reiterated the idea. "If you brew a pour-over coffee, the physics there, the math, is the same you apply to water percolating through soil or magma moving through a porous rock matrix,” he said. “There are a lot of parallels beyond static generation between coffee and earth sciences."

Related: New Study Finds Link Between Coffee Preferences and Weight Gain

The study itself is a collaboration between two very different scientific fields. One group of researchers was interested in coffee grinding and the other was a team of volcanologists interested in studying lightning storms generated during volcanic eruptions. Though these are seemingly disparate phenomena, they essentially involve the same process on the molecular level as tiny particles accumulate an electric charge.

Méndez Harper became interested when he overheard Hendon and others one day discussing how electricity builds up during coffee grinding. "I said, ‘Oh! That’s what I spend the last five years doing, but in a different context,'" Méndez Harper recalled. The topic has become of so much interest to him that he plans to start his own lab at Portland State University to continue this specific research.

Keep this science in mind next time you're in the kitchen to make a shockingly good cup of coffee.