Food Science

Graduating Food Science Senior Harry Overly was chosen to speak at the 2001 Winter Commencement Ceremony, which will be held on Sunday, December 23 at the Kohl Center. Harry, who is from Windsor, WI, is also the Vice-President of the UW-Madison Student Body. Harry was selected from graduating seniors by the senior class officers.

There will be a new dairy course offered in the Spring semester called the "Chemistry and Technology of Dairy Products." This will replace our two previous courses on dairy foods (FS 415 and FS 421). This course will be offered by Dr. Lucey.

The Department of Food Science was delighted to have Professor David Stanley from University of Guelph visit on November 2. He presented an excellent seminar on the topic "Application of Food Material Science". He emphasized to students the strong need to understand not only chemical changes and reactions during food processing but how much useful additional information can be gained from microstructural and rheological analysis.

The Department was pleased to have Dr. Jeff Broadbent (Utah State University) present a seminar on Exopolysaccharide production in Streptococcus thermophilus on October 30. The seminar dealt with the various exopolysaccharides produced by thermophilic bacteria and some of his work on the impact of these cultures on Mozzarella cheese. Jeff is currently here in Babcock Hall on a sabbatical working with Prof. Steele.

The Department welcomes new undergraduate and graduate students for the fall semester. Advisors are listed in brackets. Freshmen: Leah Anderson (Parkin), Marie Antoniewski (Steve Ingham), Adam Lechter (Steele), Renee Lietha (Steve Ingham), Dawn Preston (Steele), Allan Sass (Steele). Junior: Rebecca White (Parkin). MS grad students: Mark Dettmann (Richards), Baiyan Dong (Denes), Osama Hiki (Kaspar), Soujanya Jampala (Gunasekaran), and Tammy Lin (Lucey). PhD grad students: Mateo Budinich (Plhak) and Mee-Ryung Lee (Lucey). We wish them all success in their respective programs.

A new short course was held on the topic of "Membrane Processing of Dairy Products" on October 30-31. The course was put together jointly by the Department of Food Science and the Center for Dairy Research. The course was so popular that it was completely sold out and there are some people already on a waiting list to attend next years course. Obviously, another winner from the top ranked Dairy Extension program in the country.

Babcock Dairy Plant joins other plants in handling of BST milk. Read more about BST and the quality of Babcock Dairy milk at: BST Fact Sheet. Call Tom Blattner (tmblattn@facstaff.wisc.edu) at 263-5144 with questions regarding BST and Babcock Hall Dairy Plant.

On September 24th General Mills personnel visited Babcock Hall for an Open House for students. Up to 30 students attended the session. The four General Mills personnel introduced themselves (they were all UW alumni), what they do and gave an overview of their company. This is an annual recruiting/informational event.

Dr. Mark Etzel has been in the news recently for his work on developing food protein powders that do not contain phenylalanine. People with phenylketonuria (PKU) cannot digest phenylalanine and this can cause very serious problems including brain damage. Mark has developed a method to separate a milk protein fraction that is produced during cheesemaking, which is free of phenylalanine. This new protein powder can be used to manufacture a variety of foods for people with PKU.

The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation (Portugal) recently awarded Cristina Esteves a 10-month fellowship to continue her Ph.D. research work in the laboratory of Dr. John Lucey.

A grand opening and dedication ceremony was held July 31, 2001, at the recently renovated Babcock Hall Dairy Store. read more...

At the July 2001 American Dairy Science Association Meeting in Indianapolis, the Food Science Department took home two top awards. John Lucey received the ADSA Foundation Scholarship Award in Dairy Foods and his MS student, Achyuth Hassan, won the graduate student paper competition with a presentation on "Development of two analytical methods to quantify the concentrations of soluble and insoluble Calcium in Cheddar cheese". This is the second year in a row that UW has won the graduate student paper competition as Ed Dudley from Jim Steele's lab won it in Baltimore. The Graduate Student Competition is sponsored by the National Milk Producers Federation. The purpose of the Foundation Scholar Awards is to recognize two young scholars (one from the Dairy Foods Division and one from the Production Division) and their potential in research and educational leadership. The foundation scholar awardee presents a symposium-type address at the meeting and is asked to identify critical issues affecting the future of the dairy industry.

Congratulations to Chetan S. Rao, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Food Science, who was recently chosen to receive the Louis and Elsa Thomsen Wisconsin Distinguished Fellowship award based on his excellent academic performance and research productivity during graduate study. This award, offered by the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, was established by the estate of Elsa Thomsen. Mr. Rao is currently working on his dissertation titled "Role of water in the control of protein functionality at the lipid water interfaces" under the supervision of Prof. S. Damodaran. Mr. Rao was also named a winner of the Vilas Grant for domestic travel. The Vilas grant is awarded by the UW-Graduate student council.

Congratulations also to Jill Losinski, one of Dr. B. Ingham's students, who has received a John Brandt Memorial Fellowship to help support her graduate program this coming year. Each year, the Litchfield, Minnesota-based Foundation selects several Upper Midwest scholarship recipient(s) doing graduate work in the broad areas of dairy animal, food science, or agribusiness. These awards are given in memory of John Brandt, an organizer and president of Land O' Lakes from 1923 until his death in 1953. You can reach Jill for more details at jalosinski@students.wisc.edu.

The Dairy Store reopened for business on July 5th. Renovation of the store began in mid February and was completed ahead of schedule. read more...

The successful 2001 Product Development Team were featured on the NBC15 nightly news shows that were aired on July 5th. The segments included interviews with Achyuth Hassan and Colleen Madden as well as a discussion of the Handicotti product. The other team members and the excellent poster that the team made for the IFT contest were also featured. The team was also featured in an article in Food Ingredients Online, an industry newsletter.

Congratulations to the Product Development Team which has won the 2001 IFTSA Product Development Competition. (See the full story on the CALS web site.) This was for the pasta product: Handicotti. The team is Achyuth Hassan (team chairperson), Kole Ewoldt, Debby Levenson, Chad Fahrenkrug, Laura Lebak, Vidya Sridhar, Colleen Madden, Erin Natvig, and Peggy Mak with advisor Dr. Leslie Plhak. The team is made up of both undergrad and grad students. This is the first time that UW has won the competition.

The Handicotti product provides busy consumers with the tastes found at gourmet Italian restaurants in a convenient, handheld meal. Tender manicotti shaped pasta is filled with a specially seasoned tomato sauce, savory Italian sausage crumbles, and rich ricotta cheese. Handicotti is designed as an ideal quick meal for any fast-paced, pasta-loving consumer.

The other finalists were Rutgers, Cornell, North Carolina State University, Michigan State University and Cal-Poly.

Dr. John Lucey was recently featured on various Wisconsin television stations on the topic of how cheese quality is improved through research. This was part of the WMMB promotion of June as the Dairy month. This is the second time that he has been on the air in recent months; in April his group was featured on TV3 news doing a presentation on "What keeps your yogurt from turning to mush?". This was a demo done as part of the Science Expo 2001 which involved nearly 200 outstanding high school students from 25 Wisconsin high schools coming to CALS for a glimpse of exciting work going on in the college.

Congratulations to the Product Development Team which recently won the 2001 NASA Food Technology Commercial Space Center, Product Development Competition. This was for the Chomp milk and cereal bar which had previously been placed 2nd place in the 2000 IFTSA Product Development Competition. The team is Achyuth Hassan, Laura Lebak and James Colby with advisor Dr. Leslie Plhak.

Dr. Jeff Broadbent, Associate Professor on sabbatical from the Nutrition and Food Science Department at Utah State University, is working with Jim Steele on the application of microbial genomics to the manufacture of cheese.

Professor Robert Bradley has announced plans to retire after July 1, 2001. Bob joined the Department in 1964 and has focused his career in dairy processing. As coach of the Dairy Products Judging Team he has brought home many trophies over the years. A retirement reception is being planned.

Professor William Wendorff is the new Chairman of the Department of Food Science effective July 1, 2001.

Dr. Scott Rankin joins the Department in July. Scott's background in Food Processing will fill a critical need in the Extension program.

Contruction on the Dairy Store is nearly complete. Here are a few photos of the work in progress.

Professor Emeritus Elmer Marth has published an autobiography titled Milk, Microbes and Marth. Copies can be ordered from the Food Research Institute.

Professor Srinivasan Damodaran has been in the news lately for his idea to make biodegradable diapers out of waste fish catch.

Monica L. Theis has won the 2001 Spitzer Excellence in Teaching Award. Read the press release.

The Dairy Store is closed for remodeling until July 2001. Not to worry, a temporary store is open in the basement of Babcock Hall, so ice cream and other dairy treats are still available.

The June 2000 Food Science Newsletter is available as a PDF file.