Dr. Karin Allen

The start-up company called Teton Botanicals Inc. (www.tetonbotanicals.com) has acquired the rights to a patented technology for structuring liquid vegetables oils.  The licensing company called Coasun Inc., (www.coasun.com) works primarily with the food industry and provides a solution that dramatically reduces saturated fats in foods without adding trans fatty acids.  Coasun technology is very useful in the baking industry which is challenged to reduce saturated fats while maintaining quality consumers demand.

By modifying the Coasun formula slightly, Teton Botanicals Inc. has successfully produced an all natural lotion made with avocado oil.  Avocado oil is typically used in high-end cosmetics only.   Teton Botanicals products hydrate the skin, and the natural oils add a lasting moisture barrier that prevent water from evaporating from the skin.  The lotion feels cool and soothing when applied.

Various essential oils and combinations are added for fragrance and to extend shelf life.  This was an important contribution from Dr. Karin Allen.   According to Steve Bernet at Teton Botanicals, “we have dramatically increased shelf life with USU’s help, however we will probably never achieve the 2 – 3 year shelf life of ordinary lotions.  Fundamentally, our product is made with edible, natural ingredients and no chemical preservatives.  We can’t expect to have the same shelf life as products containing petroleum distillates, petrolatums, mineral oils, chemical preservatives, and so on. ”

Bernet also asks, “If you can’t eat it, why shoud we put it on our skin?    And we don’t consume fresh food after weeks of storage, why should we put products that last years on our skin?  Afterall, our skin is the bodies largest organ.”

For an in depth article please visit: https://economicdevelopment.usu.edu/htm/in-the-news/articleID=9873

Teton Botanicals Inc. has started a test marketing program in the Logan, Utah area with the launch of their Logan Botanicals brand  (www.loganbotanicals.com)

For more information please contact:  Steve Bernet, Teton Botanicals Inc. , sbernet@tetonbotanicals.com, 435-753-3661

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This year’s success is thanks to the vendors that supported the event, the volunteers that worked at the event and helped organize it, the speakers, and everyone that attended.   There is a strong food and confectionary industry in the Rocky Mountains and it is growing and getting stronger.

Thank you also to the Food Science students from Brigham Young University and Utah State University that participated in this year’s poster competition. 

Participants from Brigham Young University included:

• Trenton W. Horner
• Stacia Woodworth and Christopher Hunt
• Jonathan Swindler
• Brenner Freeman

USU Food Science Students included:

• Ranjeeta Wadhwani
• Rossarin Tansawat
• Ashwini Wagh
• Amrita Dubey
• Albert Lihon Zhou
• Michael Young
• Dallin Snow (not present)
• Rebekah Lance

Once again this year the judges, ten in all,  were confronted by very difficult decisions.  All work was excellent and well presented and students gained valuable experience defending their work.

Ultimately awards were presented as follows:

FIRST – Albert Lihong Zhou.  Utah State University.  Supervisor – Dr. Robert Ward

SECOND – Ranjeeta Wadhwani. Utah State University.  Supervisor – Dr. Don J. McMahon

THIRD – Jonathan Swindler. Brigham Young University. Supervisor – MA Lloyd

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I am personally honored to have received the Researcher of the Year Award for the College of Agriculture and am in debt for this acheivement to my graduate students, my department and colleagues, the College of Agriculture, Utah State University, and my colleagues, collaborators, and mentors around the world.

This year’s Research of the Year Awards were presented to:

• Silvana Martini – College of Agriculture
• Jeffrey Doyle – Jon M. Huntsman School of Business
• Brian Higginbotham – Emma Eccles Jones College of Education & Human Services
• Anhong Zhou – College of Engineering
• Javier Dominguez – College of Humanities, Arts & Social Sciences
• Phaedra Budy – College of Natural Resources
• Cheng-Wei (Tom) Chang – College of Science

For career accomplishments the D. Wynne Thorne Career Research Award was bestowed to Steve Scheiner – College of Science.

Congratulations again to everyone!    Silvana Martini.

• Dr. Jeff Broadbent
• Dr. Jong-Su Eun
• Dr. Silvana Martini
• Dr. Donald J. McMahon
• Dr. Brian Nummer
• Dr. Marie Walsh
• Dr. Robert Ward
• Dr. Allen Young

Click on the following link to access UEN’s series on cheese science:

http://www.uen.org/tv/cheese/scientist.php

Marangoni’s research has demonstrated the relationship between food microstructure and physiological response in humans.  It facinating and important work.  I hope you will join us for a luncheon event organized by the Center for Advanced Nutrition.  Please RSVP.    The luncheon and speaker talks will be held at the Junction on USU campus.

ABSTRACT

Structuring liquid oils using non-conventional strategies: organogels, crystal hydrates and polymers

Alejandro G. Marangoni

Dept. of Food Science, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON N1G2W1, Canada

Increasing public concerns over excessive saturated and trans fat intake from manufactured food products has lead to the search for alternative strategies to structure liquid oils into semisolid fats without addition of large amounts of unhealthy trans and saturated fats. Surfactant-like small molecules have been shown to self-assemble into long fibrils, effectively causing oil gelation at concentrations as low as 0.5%. Phytosterols, ceramides, and 12-hydroxystearic acid have been shown to be effective organogelators. Liquid oils can also be structured by microencapsulation within multilamellar vesicles, with walls composed of monoglyceride hydrates in the alpha-gel state. The surface potential of these monoglyceride vesicles is then adjusted so as to maximize inter-vesicle interactions and the formation of a cellular solid with oil-filled cells. These monoglyceride gels have recently been proven to have excellent functional characteristics in baking applications as well as for omega-3 oil stabilization. High-molecular weight polymers such as ethylcellulose have also been successfully used by our group to gel oil in the absence of water. This development of a polymer-stabilized organogel is very promising since these polymers are widely available and are food-grade. The development of a new way to make fat exploiting the self-assembly properties of food-grade molecules is at hand.

ABOUT DR. ALEJANDRO MARANGONI

Alejandro Marangoni is a professor and Canada Research Chair in Food and Soft Materials Science at the University of Guelph.

His work concentrates on the physical properties of foods, particularly fat crystallization and structure. He has published over 200 refereed research article and four books.

He is the recipient of many awards including a 1999 Premier’s Research Excellence Award, the first Young Scientist Award form the American Oil Chemists’ Society (2000), a Canada Research Chair (2001, renewed in 2006), two Distinguished Researcher Awards from the Ontario Innovation Trust (2002), a Career Award from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (2002), an E.W.R. Steacie Memorial Fellowship (2002) – given to the top 6 Canadian scientists from all disciplines – and the T.L. Mounts Award from AOCS in 2004.

Dr. Marangoni is a past chair of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada’s Plant Biology and Food Science Grant Selection Committee, member of NSERC’s E.W.R. Steacie Memorial Fellowship selection committee, Editor-in-Chief of Food Research International (Elsevier), and an Associate Editor of the Journal of the American Oil Chemists’ Society (Springer).

Dr. Marangoni has co-founded two high-technology food companies and is the co-recipient of the 2008 Guelph Partners of Innovation “Innovator of the year” award for his discovery of a zero trans, low saturate shortening alternative which could revolutionize the baking industry.

Student Research Poster Competition

April 6, 2010

Southtowne Expo Center

Call for Abstracts Due date:  March 22, 2010, 5 pm

Download Application Form

The next Expo.  in Sandy, Utah on April 6th 2010 is the best opportunity for anyone in the food and candy business to find all the information, ingredient suppliers, and experts in one place.

Seminars will be held during the day.  The Expo. runs 5:30pm – 8:30pm.  More information about speakers and topics will be be available soon so please check back.

LOCATION:  South Towne Expo Centre, Sandy UT

Schedule this event in your calendar now!

To register please visit:  http://www.iftutah.org/register_to_attend

To download the FLYER please click here:  2010 Food and Candy Expo Flyer _5_

SUPPLIERS !!!

Don’t miss your chance to exhibit?  This is a golden opportunity to connect with customers and prospects throughout the Rocky Mountain regions.

For your information about exhibiting please visit:  http://www.iftutah.org/events

The lab continues to grow and we are happy to welcome some of our newest members.  Ricardo Tejeda joined our lab in September as an undergraduate student.  Vern Hart, joined the lab in December as a Research Assistant while completing his Ph.D. in the Physics Department.  All these new additions were possible thanks to the financial support of several multinational companies, federal grants,  and private agency funding, and funding from Utah State University.

As usual, Curtis Maughan is taking care of the sensory lab.  The cheese and meat descriptive panel and the consumer panels are keeping him busy.  Also,  our descriptive panelists (meat and cheese) must be thanked for the service they provide to the Department, the University and the community in general.

Other members of the lab, such as Suyapa, Rebekah, and Richard are making progress in their projects and we are looking forward to publish their data in 2010.   Last, but not least, we will like to congratulate Jiwon Lee for graduating this December and hope that she will be back in the Department as a graduate student next Fall.

As you can see, lots of things happened this year, and we hope that next year will be as productive as this one!

Have a Happy Holiday Season!

The UPR program Access Utah is sponsored by the Utah State University Center for Advanced Nutrition.  For more information about UPR please visit:  www.upr.org

It was the first time for CAN to exhibit at the event  but notwithstanding we had incredible results and looking forward to converting this to new business for the Center.  There is no doubt that the nutritional supplements, energy bar, and meal replacement is alive and well.  The isles were packed with prospects for two solid days and all vendors we talked with were very pleased with their results.

I was pleased to be part of the incredible team that worked the booth and visited numerous exhibits to promote CAN.   I look forward to Supply Side West 2010!

Please contact any of our 2009 Supply Side West team for more information:

Dr. Michael Lefevre  michael.lefevre@usu.edu

Sheryl Aguilar  RD., CDE  sheryl.aguilar@usu.edu

Janet Radford Bergeson RN. MS  janet.bergeson@usu.edu

Winona Perry  winona.perry@usu.edu

Dr. Robert (Bob) Ward  robert.ward@usu.edu

Dr. Korry Hintze  Korry.Hintze@usu.edu

Dr. Silvana Martini  silvana.martini@usu.edu

For more information please also visit the Center for Advanced Nutrition at  www.can.usu.edu

We all hope to see you at Supply Side West 2010!