Novel Composite Flours for Globally Nutritious Foods
Novel Composite Flours for Globally Nutritious Foods
The ‘Global Nutritious Foods Project’ represents a collaborative endeavor that unites the expertise of three distinguished institutions:
The Department of Plant, Soil and Microbial Sciences at Michigan State University, the Department of Consumer & Food Sciences at the University of Pretoria in South Africa, and the University of the West Indies, Mona.
The UP researchers will focus on the optimization of the fermentation of maize flour, its nutritional and sensory properties to contribute to the nutrition status and wellbeing of consumers in sub-Saharan Africa. This includes food product development to meet the demands of a growing, more urbanized African population, the exploration of an African food staple to make products not only nutritionally adequate but also appealing, appetizing and convenient.
The Department of Consumer and Food Sciences has state of the art Food Research Laboratory, Pilot Plant fitted with a milling, extrusion and drying equipment, and a Sensory laboratory with online data collection capacity. In view of this, the department is appropriately suited and has the necessary equipment, infrastructure and resources to carry out the proposed research
Research on food and nutrition insecurity at the University of the West Indies, Mona campus (UWI) has focused on the partial replacement of imported wheat with locally produced alternate flour from roots and tubers, namely cassava and sweet potato. In collaboration with the Government of Colombia, CIAT and CLAYUCA, the UWI established the Agricultural Research & Innovation Facility (ARIF) at which is sited a pilot plant (nominal capacity = 1 metric ton per day) to produce natural, gluten free high quality bakery flour – for use in the food industry.
Through its Master of Science program in Food and Agro-Processing Technology, the Department of Chemistry at UWI has made significant linkages in the local food industry and continue to have access to a cadre of motivated and capable graduate students to assist with this project, thereby providing training and learning opportunities
MSU’s researchers will utilize a dry bean cultivar with high iron bioavailability and optimizing the milling process to yield dry bean flours with high protein and reduced off flavors. The team’s laboratory is equipped with, analytical hammer (PX-MFC 90D, Kinematica) mill, Philips fresh pasta maker, balances, a Perten Instruments Rapid Visco Analyzer 4500 system for measuring pasting properties of flours, TA.XT2i Texture Analyzer (Texture Technologies Corp., Scarsdale, NY, USA); and a Hunter LabScan XE colorimeter for color determination. Our team has access to MSU’s Food Processing and Innovation Center (FPIC) facilities and expertise.
FPIC is Michigan’s leading independent commercial food development, processing, packaging and research facility. The facility houses adequate equipment to meet the research objectives.
Additionally, the research team has access to MSU’s Food Sensory laboratory for product sensory evaluations, food product development and sensory panel training. In sum, ample facilities, a wide variety of equipment and expertise are available for the synergistic research planned.
Dr. Hooper has collaborated with Dr. Thompson previously as a graduate student at the University of the West Indies, working on the value addition of Jamaica’s indigenous foods and resources. We are expanding this work by partnering with researchers from the University of 6 Pretoria, South Africa to formulate a nutrient dense composite flour to combat issues of iron and vitamin A deficiencies in each region.
Novel Composite Flour for Globally Nutritious Foods - is supported by Michigan State University through the Alliance for African Partnerships - PIRA grant program and administered by The University of the West Indies, (Mona campus, Jamaica), the University of Pretoria (South Africa) and Michigan State University.
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