The PRELUDIUM contest is settled!
- Mgr inż. Aleksandra Matys – “Study of the impact of pulsed electric field on the metabolism of selected fruits and vegetables”
- Mgr inż. Katarzyna Wierzchowska – “Biochemical pathways of storage lipid biosynthesis in oleogenic yeast cells by cultivation in media with a hydrophobic carbon source – a molecular look”
mgr inż. Aleksandra Matys, Institute of Food Sciences, funds granted: PLN 129,320.
Study of the impact of pulsed electric field on the metabolism of selected fruits and vegetables
Pulsed electric field (PEF) is a non-thermal food processing technology that is finding more and more applications in the food industry. The main action of PEF is to interfere with the cellular structure. As a result of electroporation, pores are formed in the cell membrane, which can then expand, aggregate and even close again. To assess the degree of destruction of tissue treated with a pulsed electric field, e.g. electrical conductivity measurements, microscopic analysis and nuclear magnetic resonance in the time domain. Each of these methods requires some intervention in the tissue. Mechanical damage to the plant immediately affects its visual quality, but in the long term it causes metabolic changes, the effects of which in the form of broadly understood changes in quality are detected after some time. Each applied process causes stress in plants, which in turn causes physiological and metabolic changes. Full understanding of the mechanism
changes resulting from stress would make it possible to develop a method to reduce its effects. The pulsed electric field can act as an abiotic stressor, affecting the metabolism of the treated tissue. Considering that the pulsed electric field treatment itself, as well as all the above-mentioned methods of evaluating the effects of electroporation, are based on the need to interfere with the treated tissue, a method of measuring the effects obtained in a non-invasive way is necessary, so that the obtained result actually refers to only one of a specific process. Such a method may prove to be the determination of biospeckle activity.
The aim of the work will be to investigate the impact of a pulsed electric field with a variable amount of energy supplied to the treated apples and carrots on their metabolic activity measured over time. In addition, an attempt will be made to use biospeckle activity and respiratory activity as potential non-invasive methods to quantify the scale of electroporation. The obtained results may provide a more accurate description of the mechanism of the impact of the pulsed electric field on plant tissues.
mgr inż. Katarzyna Joanna Wierzchowska, Institute of Food Sciences, funds granted: PLN 209,999.
The constantly increasing population is connected with the need to search for new sources
of food. Today, nearly a billion people in the world are starving. There is therefore a need to increase food production on a global scale. However, escalation by the solutions used so far may be too heavy a burden on the ecosystem. Therefore, meeting the nutritional needs of the population requires the search for unconventional sources of nutrients, including fats (lipids). Valuable unsaturated fatty acids playing an important role in human physiology with not only anti-inflammatory, but also immunomodulatory, anti-atherosclerotic or anti-cancer properties, conventionally obtained from oil plants or marine fish.
A new sustainable alternative to known vegetable fats can be microbial oils stored in oleogenic yeast cells capable of accumulating fats in the amount above 20% of the dry weight of the cell, the cultivation of which is not related to the use of large agricultural areas, or the need for constant sunlight or irrigation…
The project consists of five research stages, starting from the selection of well-absorbed hydrophobic carbon sources, as well as strains for research using genotypic analysis.
In order to explore the metabolic processes accompanying the accumulation of microbial oil by yeast, it is necessary to select markers characteristic of both de novo and ex novo pathways, and then analyze the pathways in substrates with a hydrophobic carbon source under changing environmental conditions. Microbial oils are undoubtedly a product with great potential, but there is still a lack of basic knowledge about the course of their accumulation in the cells of microorganisms. The research will use the model species of oleogenic yeast Yarrowia lipolytica with special adaptability to various environmental conditions and a fully sequenced genome
In the PRELUDIUM 21 competition, 5 projects from the Warsaw University of Life Sciences were selected:
https://www.sggw.edu.pl/piecioro-naukowcow-z-sggw-na-liscie-laureatow-konkursu-ncn-preludium/