October 16, 2023 • 45 mins
In this episode, we dive into the world of food processing with Kevin Mis Solval, associate professor in the University of Georgia's Department of Food Science and Technology. Discover how Georgia's food industry is embracing innovation, blending tradition with modernity to craft sustainable, high-quality products for the world in this episode of Cultivating Curiosity. Kevin discusses his groundbreaking research that embraces both cutting-edge technologies and centuries-old techniques. We hear about unexpected but successful ventures, like turning jellyfish into valuable food products! Listen in to learn how these innovations are reshaping the state's food landscape, creating sustainable solutions and setting the stage for a future where creativity meets industry expertise.
Resources:
Mini peach processing line photos
USDA-NIFA: https://www.nifa.usda.gov/
USAID: https://www.usaid.gov/
CAES Newswire stories:
UGA researchers develop market for jellyfish proteins in Georgia
UGA food scientists get creative with Georgia commodities
Grant boosts development of novel food ingredients from jellyfish
UGA food science student wins USDA NIFA predoctoral fellowship
More about cannonball jellies: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pi4zYrTSP0E
Edited by Jordan Powers and Emily Davenport
Produced by Jordan Powers and Emily Davenport
Music and sound effects by Mason McClintock, an Athens-based singer, songwriter and storyteller who creates innovative soul-pop music that transcends traditional genre boundaries. Hailing from small-town Southeast Georgia, Mason's influences range from the purest pop to the most powerful gospel. Mason is a former Georgia 4-H'er and a recent University of Georgia graduate! Listen to his music on Spotify.
Almanac is an annual publication that provides a window into the work being done at CAES to make the world increasingly healthy, equitable and sustainable. We are pleased to announce that the 2024 edition is now available online. Explore stories of science in service of humanity and the environment.
Get social with us!
Follow CAES on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn and check out UGA Extension on on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn for the latest updates.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Sound Effect (00:00):
[music]
Emily Davenport (00:01):
Welcome to Cultivating Curiosity, where we
get down and dirty with theexperts on all the ways science
and agriculture touch our livesfrom what we eat to how we live.
I'm Emily Davenport.
Jordan Powers (00:12):
And I'm Jordan Powers, and we're from the
University of Georgia's Collegeof Agricultural and
Environmental Sciences.
Sound Effect (00:19):
[chime]
Jordan Powers (00:21):
While most episodes of Cultivating
Curiosity are recorded in ourAthens, Georgia studio, a lot of
the amazing work that happens atCAES and UGA Extension occurs
across the state. Today, we areat the UGA Griffin Campus, about
30 miles south of Atlanta, withKevin Mis Solval, associate
professor in the Department ofFood Science and Technology.
(00:41):
Kevin, thanks for having us outto Griffin today.
Kevin Mis Solval (00:44):
Thank you very much. Thank you for the
opportunity.
Jordan Powers (00:46):
Absolutely. We are really excited to dive into
this conversation and, spoiler,I think Emily's extra excited on
some of the topics we'll covertoday.
Sound Effect (00:52):
[chime]
Jordan Powers (00:55):
Before we dive into his background, we got to
peek into Kevin's lab inGriffin, where he had built an
entire miniaturized version of apeach processing line, where
peaches are washed and packedbefore distribution. This
project is funded by the GeorgiaDepartment of Agriculture and is
investigating ways to improve onthe washing and packing process
in order to minimize bacteriabefore the peaches make their
(01:17):
way to suppliers nationwide.
Kevin Mis Solval (01:19):
So the equipment that we're looking
directly at is our simulatedpacking, washing and packing
equipment for peaches, turns outthat there is an issue with
cleaning some of the rollersthat are in this type of
equipment. So what we're tryingto do is to explore better ways
(01:40):
to clean these rollers usingtechnologies that we are
developing in my lab. And sowith those designs, we are going
to be able to clean anddisinfect these commonly used
rollers more effectively. And sothe intention of building this
pilot plant line is to mimic theconditions that you would see in
(02:04):
real packing operations offruits and vegetables. So as a
process engineer, I like tobuild things, I like to study
things, I like to understand howthings work, and how do we make
things better for the foodindustry in general?
Jordan Powers (02:21):
Absolutely. And some of that research is
happening behind a computer. Butsome of it's happening by
building a processing line.
Kevin Mis Solval (02:26):
Exactly, exactly. Yeah. That's how you
understanding how you teach yourstudents as well to understand
the processes that you want toimprove.
Jordan Powers (02:33):
We took some photos of the mini processing
line that we'll share in theshow notes. In the meantime,
let's get back to the interview.
Sound Effect (02:39):
[chime]
Jordan Powers (02:41):
Can you tell us a little bit about your background
and how you got interested infood science?
Kevin Mis Solval (02:46):
Born and raised in Guatemala, Central
America. Growing up in adeveloping country, I was
fascinated with some of thetechnologies that I saw during
my especially high school years.
I was fascinated with the waysugar cane is made. So Guatemala
is one of the largest sugar caneproducers in the world. So when
(03:07):
I went to high school there, Ihad the opportunity to intern at
the largest sugarcane mill inGuatemala, where I was
fascinated about, you know, allthese pieces of equipment, large
pieces of equipment that wereused to make sugarcane. And
that's how I was reallyinterested in learning more
about food processing as an areastudy was I wanted to become a
(03:29):
process engineer. The only wayyou could have done it back 20,
25 years ago in Guatemala was tobecome a chemical engineer. I
didn't want to study chemicalengineering per se. I wanted to
study something more relatedcloser to foods, to food
processing. So it turns out thatin Guatemala at the time there
(03:50):
were not really any foodscience, food processing
schools. So I was looking at away to pursue a bachelor's
degree in food, food science,food engineering outside
Guatemala. So I had theopportunity to go to Honduras
and study Food Science andTechnology in Honduras, where I
met incredible people from allover Latin America. So the place
(04:12):
that I went was called ZamoranoUniversity. During those years,
I learned about not only thedifferent cultures about Latin
America, from Latin America,from Mexico all over to Chile,
and I had incredible mentors,incredible professors who had
PhDs in food processing, anyarea of possible area in
(04:33):
agriculture right away. So whenI was a senior in Zamorano in
Honduras, I had the opportunityto come to the Louisiana State
University as an intern for fourmonths. So I came in and I
interned in Dr. SubramaniamSathivel's lab. We conducted a
project with transformingcatfish oil into biodiesel.
Emily Davenport (04:54):
Wow.
Kevin Mis Solval (04:54):
So it was really interesting, you know,
that was a very interestingproject and I was really
fascinated by it. You know, whenI was young and dumb, probably,
you know, wasn't reallyinterested too much in science.
By the way, I never ever thoughtabout going to become a
professor, you know, ever. Allthat I want to do, you know, get
a college degree, back inGuatemala, of course, you know,
(05:15):
get a college degree and get ajob and maybe start a family and
I probably didn't have like, bigdreams. All that I wanted to do
was, like, work hard, focus onmy work one day at a time. So
um, when I came to LSU for thatinternship, my major professor
at the time offered me to returnas a master's student. One of
(05:35):
the limitations that I had atthe time was that my English was
not good. So I had to improve ita lot. So I wanted to come back
to the United States and get adegree. My goal was to return
one day to Latin America andwork in Guatemala or any country
in Central America, that's allthat I wanted to do. Anyways, I
came back to LSU for my master'sin Food Science and Technology,
(05:57):
which I completed in 2011. Sothen after that, again, my major
professor asked me to stay forPhD program. But this time in
Biological Engineering. I had tothink about a little bit whether
I wanted to pursue that becausethat was going to be like four
more years of study. And so in amajor that I wasn't completely
familiar with, I had to take alot of courses in engineering
(06:19):
and do more challenging studies.
But I was having a good time atLSU. And in school, and I had a
lot of friends and we were doinggreat job, interesting research.
And I decided to continue onthat path. So you four years
later, I completed my PhD inBiological Engineering. I didn't
know what to do actually wasmore maybe inclined to join
industry. But at the same time,I had something inside of me
(06:41):
that I wanted to mentor youngpeople. And I had extensively
published a lot of scientificarticles regarding process
optimizations, food processingoperations, developing a high
value food ingredients. I talkedto my major advisor, and he
recommended me maybe to improvemy teaching skills, because in
grad school, I never had theopportunity to teach a complete
(07:02):
course. So I took a teaching jobat University of Holy Cross in
New Orleans, Louisiana, where Itaught food processing, physics,
and advanced physics courses forundergrads. And I definitely
loved that job. Definitely likeit. You know, I enjoy working
with young people. We were likeexperimenting, brainstorming all
the time. And after two years, Ifelt that I wanted to include a
(07:25):
research component in my career.
So I was looking for positionsin both academia and in
industry. So academic jobs,especially faculty jobs, take a
lot longer. The interviewprocess, it's about a year or
so. But industry, the hiringprocess is a lot faster. I got a
job on nanotechnology company inDayton, Ohio, where I was a
(07:49):
process engineer and I was incharge of managing the spray
drying operations for thecompany. We're doing a little
nano sized products for energystorage applications. So it was
a fascinating job, I mean, Idefinitely learned more about
material science, I only workedwith material scientist and
material engineers. And it turnsout that the technology that I
(08:10):
was in charge of which by theway, is my area of expertise,
spray drying, nobody in thematerial world knows too much
about it. I mean, it's atechnology that is widely known
in food and pharmaceuticalindustries, but it's been
introduced now to other fields,because, you know, its
versatility and costeffectiveness. So I was in
(08:30):
charge of a big group ofengineers, were doing all kinds
of products, production andresearch. And I really liked
that job. Unfortunately, Iwasn't working with foods. And
most of the work that I wasdoing, I wasn't really doing too
much work outside thatparticular technology, which in
a way I enjoyed because itdefinitely allowed me to go a
lot deeper in understanding thattechnology, and especially large
(08:52):
scales, and we're doing a lot ofproduction scales. So when my
current position was advertised,I got a call from my major
professor back from LSU, right?
And he said, hey, Kevin, youshould apply to this position,
you're the perfect candidate forit. And I wasn't really
convinced, because I knowUniversity of Georgia has a
great, great reputation,especially in Food Science and
Technology field. And I waslike, there is no way I'm gonna
(09:14):
get that job. But I'll do mybest and I will interview, I
will apply. You never know aboutthese positions, right? So I
remember it was February 2018.
And a month later, the chair ofFood Science and Technology
actually called me, Dr. RakeshSingh and offered me the
position and I was definitelyyou know, surprised. I couldn't
(09:34):
believe it. I couldn't believeit. Fast forward, I joined the
program in the fall of 2018.
I've been here in the program onthe Griffin Campus for five
years now. I don't rememberhaving a better time in my life
than I'm having it today. It's agreat opportunity. I'm so
blessed. I'm so grateful to havethis position. So that's how'd I
get here, you know.
Jordan Powers (09:55):
And on top of that, we heard that just three
weeks ago, you said you receiveda promotion to associate
professor, so congratulations.
Kevin Mis Solval (10:02):
Thank you very much, appreciate it.
Emily Davenport (10:04):
What an exciting journey. And it's great
to have people looking out foryou to hook you up with a
position like, well, at leastput the position in your line of
sight, to have your professor...
Kevin Mis Solval (10:14):
Sure. Yeah.
Jordan Powers (10:15):
That mentor sounds like a solid mentor.
Emily Davenport (10:17):
Yeah, yeah
Kevin Mis Solval (10:19):
It is. It is definitely,
Emily Davenport (10:21):
That's awesome.
We know that you have an 80%research, 20% UGA Extension
appointment. So what does theday to day look like for you?
Kevin Mis Solval (10:29):
Having a lot of research appointment requires
me to spend a lot of time doingresearch. That means reading
articles, brainstorming.
Unfortunately, I don't work toomuch in the lab doing the
experimental analysis and all ofthat. I did that during the
first couple of years that I gothere. But I spent that time to
train my students, train mytechnicians, my senior
scientist, so they can do it nowfor me. So they understand every
(10:52):
time that I instruct them what Iwant them to do, they will do
it. So now my day looks likemore towards reading research
articles, writing a lot. So Iwould say 90% of my day is
writing. It's writing, readingand reading, understanding, what
is the current research in foodscience? How does it look like?
How do we implement the newknowledge into our research so
(11:16):
we can expand the scientificknowledge in our field? So it
takes a lot of time, takes a lotof effort, because what happens
most of the time is I get easilydistracted by many things, many
ideas. We may have like 10 goodideas, excellent ideas, but then
we had to make a choice aboutselecting the best one, not even
(11:38):
the best two, the best one. Soyour chances of getting funded
and published in the world arehigher if you focus on maybe one
or two ideas. So that's how myday looks like doing a lot of
research. Mentoring students,which I enjoy a lot working with
young people, sometimes theyhave a background in food
(11:59):
processing, food science. Mostof the time is very limited. So
it's my job to actually trainthem. And that takes time, as
well. It takes time, takeseffort from both sides. And I'm
very happy and glad to have hadgood grad students.
Sound Effect (12:14):
[chime]
Emily Davenport (12:16):
Kevin does a great job mentoring his
students. His doctoral student,Peter Chiarelli, just received a
pre-doctoral fellowship fromUSDA NIFA. For his research,
we'll add a link to the story inthe show notes for you to learn
more. By the way, USDA NIFA isthe United States Department of
Agriculture's National Instituteof Food and Agriculture. They
(12:37):
provide leadership and fundingfor programs that advance
agriculture-related sciences.
We'll link their website in theshow notes too.
Sound Effect (12:46):
[chime]
Kevin Mis Solval (12:46):
Like I said, most of my time is dedicated to
doing research and doing a lotof experimental work, planning
and brainstorming and publishingthat work. In my case, it
doesn't really matter how muchwork we do in the lab unless we
publish it right. So we'llpublish it in top journals,
because we want to improve therecognition of our department in
(13:09):
the scientific field. So that'spart of my job to make sure that
the work that we do here is highquality, is impactful, and
expands the current sitescientific knowledge. By doing
that I'm also dedicated to trainstudents, like I said before,
not only students, but alsovisiting scientists,
technicians, and my whole team.
I collaborate with other facultymembers here in our program and
(13:30):
also in other programs acrossthe United States. And now I'm
starting to collaborate withmore people outside the US, like
people from Thailand, researcherfrom Brazil, and I think that's
the second phase now of mycareer here at UGA.
Jordan Powers (13:44):
Absolutely, keeping that impact right here
on the Griffin Campus, but thenalso taking it across the globe,
which is really exciting.
Emily Davenport (13:51):
Mm-hmm.
Kevin Mis Solval (13:51):
Yes, yes, absolutely. I do have an
Extension appointment as well. Iteach some workshops, and also
in our department like thebetter Process Control School,
where I also work with foodcompanies, train food personnel
in the US and also overseas. Forexample, I went to my home
country last year in a USaid-funded project and so I
(14:15):
helped a local company inGuatemala developing food
products that are actually beingcommercialized as we speak. It
was a fascinating experience,and sometimes these companies
back in developing countriesdon't have the resources or the
knowledge to develop good foodsthat are healthy, nutritious,
and of course safe. Those arelike the three key areas that I
(14:36):
like to address every time thatI'm assisting or helping a food
company developing a newproduct.
Sound Effect (14:40):
[chime]
Jordan Powers (14:41):
When Kevin references US aid, he's talking
about USAID, which is the UnitedStates Agency for International
Development. We'll add a link inthe show notes for you.
Sound Effect (14:54):
[chime]
Kevin Mis Solval (14:54):
More recently, again in my Extension work, I
went to Uzbekistan to assist acompany optimizing food
processing operations. So thecompany is one of the largest
exporters of fruits andvegetables in Uzbekistan. They
had issues with processoptimization. So when they're,
(15:14):
you know, train some of theirpersonnel to look after, how do
we improve operations? What arethe key areas of looking at
fresh fruits and vegetables, howdo, they can, you know, improve
those operations by using someof the technologies I'm using
here in United States. So thatwas a great, great experience.
Again, that's another projectwith USAID funded program, I'm
(15:36):
happy that my feedback has beenrecognized not only in the US,
but now outside the UnitedStates.
Jordan Powers (15:42):
A lot of that impact, like you mentioned, you
you share in those journalarticles, which is something
fantastic. And I know yourfaculty profile has quite a few
of those listed. So we'll besure to link that in the show
notes if people really want todive in and learn more about the
research that you're completing.
Emily Davenport (15:56):
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Powers (15:57):
You mentioned your students and your grad
students, what are some of theprojects that they're currently
working on? Or is there, arethere some that you can share
with us?
Kevin Mis Solval (16:04):
Well, we have a bunch of different projects.
And that's one of the beautiesof being in academic work,
right? So we can develop our ownideas. But at the same time, we
have had to diversify a lot. Myresearch, which at some point,
I'll try to cut some of the workthat we're currently doing. But
when I joined UGA, five yearsago, we started working with a
(16:25):
project with Georgia Grownpomegranate, most of these
pomegranates are sold in thefresh market, right? So we saw
an opportunity to develop highvalue for ingredients and see
how we can help the industry todiversify a little bit and also
understand how they can utilizebyproducts meaning peels and
seeds, we look at theantioxidants or their
phytochemicals in pomegranates,and we were fascinated to find
(16:48):
that pomegranate and pomegranatepeels are incredible sources of
antioxidants that may have somehealth benefits. One of the
products that we conducted wasto extract pectin from
pomegranate peels and extractalso the antioxidants from those
peels and also from the juiceand to encapsulate that and
produce a powder product thatcould have both vaccines and
(17:09):
antioxidants. That's a highvalue product. We conducted the
feasibility studies. And most ofthis work is published in
scientific journals. As part ofthis project as well, I
collaborated with Dr. JinruChen, who was the main the main
PI for the project. So she waslooking at food safety aspects
of these compounds. And it turnsout that some of these compounds
(17:30):
have strong antimicrobialproperties. And what's
fascinating, so you know, that'ssomething that we didn't know
before. That's how we startedhelping local growers in Georgia
with this new project. So onanother project that we're
currently working on is withsatsumas. Satsuma mandarins is
an emerging crop here inGeorgia. One of the challenges
for the satsuma industry is thatthere is a lot of Satsuma trees
(17:53):
that have been planted recently,and the harvesting window is
very short. So most of thatharvest is intended for fresh
market. And it's expected thatall that to satsuma mandarin
production, it's going tosaturate the market in the
coming years. And now we'reexploring alternatives to
utilize the excess fruit or thesecond grade fruit. So we're
(18:13):
looking at producing satsuma usepowders used in spray drying.
And we have found that satsumause powders are a great, great
source of vitamin C. Theadvantage of having those
products is that those productsare shelf stable, and also can
be utilized in different foodapplications. But not only food
applications, but also incosmetics, in other applications
(18:34):
where a natural ingredient isrequired. So we're excited about
that. Because it'sGeorgia-grown, it's a natural
product, and may have a lot ofpotential in the coming years. A
lot of the work that we do in mylab is feasibility studies. One
of the main questions is, can wemake this? Can we make that? So
we start with that question,right? I prefer focusing on
(18:55):
Georgia-grown commoditiespomegranate and satsuma
mandarins. And obviously, wehave had some success, and
especially with one of thecommodities that very few people
have heard of, which isjellyfish. And I've been so
fortunate to have a lot ofsuccess on that project. But
like I said before, and I thinkI'm gonna explain a little bit
more about what we're doing withjellyfish. But a lot of the work
(19:18):
that we do, again, is to dofeasibility studies, and also
how to identify economicopportunities for our growers
here. So pros, things that theynever thought of in, like,
satsuma use powders, how theycan make a profit producing
those type of products. Theyalready have the food, they
already have the raw materials,but they may not have the
knowledge of how to make, youknow, to get through that
(19:41):
process of developing these newproducts. At the University of
Georgia Griffin campus, we havegreat resources. We also have
the Food Product InnovationCenter. I work with them a lot
in developing andcommercializing some of these
ideas that we originally startedin my lab.
Jordan Powers (19:58):
What, and we'll definitely talk about FoodPIC
later, because that that couldbe a whole episode on its own.
I'm just stuck on what anamazing opportunity both for
your students to have theexperience of checking the
feasibility of products thatthey will eventually see, what
an amazing opportunity for theproducers who are finding a
whole new revenue stream intheir production. And then the
(20:19):
end consumer who, at the end ofthe day, is benefiting from
these products. I mean, it isimpactful on so many different
levels kind of throughout thisprocess from that first question
of "can we do this?" to seeing avitamin C supplement on a shelf.
That's that's pretty powerful.
Emily Davenport (20:33):
Yeah, I think it's really cool the creativity
that goes into thinking about,what else can we do with this
besides just consuming a rawfruit product or something like
that. And I love the creativityof the jellyfish. And that is
not something that we think ofas a food item at all. So can
you tell us more about your workwith the jellyfish
Kevin Mis Solval (20:55):
Sure, yeah, wow
Emily Davenport (20:55):
And your success there?
Kevin Mis Solval (20:57):
I think that by far one of the most
successful projects that wecurrently have in my program,
well, I think we started workingwith jellyfish by a stroke of
luck, I would say. Back at LSU.
I worked a lot with seafoodbyproducts, and how to develop
high value products from usingor utilizing seafood byproducts.
(21:19):
So I worked with catfish,catfish skin, catfish oil. I
work with crawfish, crawfishbyproduct. I work with shrimp,
oysters. Louisiana has a richhistory of seafood processing
and seafood innovation. So whenI came to the University of
Georgia, and I joined theprogram, in the first month into
the job I got a call from ToriStivers, who is the seafood
(21:42):
specialist for Georgia Sea Grantand Marine Extension. And she
called me she said, hey, Kevin,I saw an email of your hiring
and I saw that you graduatedfrom LSU, and I know LSU has a
strong seafood technologyprogram. And by the way, are you
familiar with jellyfish and anypotential uses for a jellyfish?
(22:03):
And I was like, what? Jellyfish?
Everyone (22:07):
[laughter]
Kevin Mis Solval (22:09):
I never heard about jellyfish in my life, and
can you explain a little bitmore about that? So she was kind
enough to meet me and turns outthat at the time, the Georgia
jellyfish industry wasstruggling. And I didn't know
there was actually a Georgiajellyfish industry. So the
(22:32):
Georgia jellyfish industry,turns out that, you know, they
catch jellyfish spring, springmonths of the year and salt it,
dry it, and then export it toAsian countries. Now, that's a
technology that is very, veryold, salting, drying jellyfish,
it's been used for centuries,and there is nothing new there.
(22:53):
The challenge that the industryhas, or had at the time, is
that, you know, one of the mainbuyers of salted, dried
jellyfishes was China. So Chinawas imposing a lot of import
taxes on these salted driedjellyfish from the United
States. So they wanted tointroduce jellyfish products
into the local market, meaningUnited States, right? But the
(23:13):
challenge is, how do we convincedomestic consumers to eat
salted, dried jellyfish? And sothat's where I came in with
ideas about commercializing, youknow, jellyfish-based products.
And I said, well, seems likejellyfish is a great commodity
and has a great potential, and Itold Tori Stivers to, you know,
(23:34):
send me some samples, I'll lookat it in my lab, explore what it
has and what we can do. Sureenough, they were kind enough to
send me samples of jellyfish, sowe're looking at different
aspects and nutritional profile,and we found that cannonball
jellyfish or jelly balls are agreat source of collagen.
Sound Effect (23:53):
[chime]
Emily Davenport (23:54):
The cannonball jellyfish is a harmless, dare we
say cute? round jellyfish,that's also known as a jelly
ball. The species is Stomolophusmeleagris. We'll add a link in
the show notes where you canlearn more about these rotund
jellies.
Sound Effect (24:09):
[chime]
Kevin Mis Solval (24:11):
When we discovered that, it was like an
aha! moment for me. I'm like,wow, it is collagen. And I knew
about the new collagen trendsthat are happening now in the
market. And then I said, well,you know, these could be
definitely a really cool rawmaterial for making
collagen-based products and theywere a little bit skeptical. You
know, there's some people, oh,we wanted to do you know, you
(24:32):
probably just freeze jellyfishand have frozen jellyfish and
sell them to the market.
Although that's a great idea,the challenge with that is we
still need to convince thedomestic consumers to eat that
jellyfish, to buy the jellyfish,right? So a lot of people are
still skeptical about eatingjellyfish. But we also found
that when you provide a powderproduct to a consumer, that
consumer is more willing to trythat new product compared to if
(24:56):
you give the whole piece of thatcommodity or that product to the
consumer. That's how everythingstarted. We started working on
that project, discovered thecollagen in jellyfish, applied
for funding because that'sanother thing that I do. A lot
of the work that we currentlydo, we need to find sponsors
from the federal government orstate government or industry to
pay for that project because,you know, research is expensive.
(25:18):
And so we had to, you know,apply for some funding and at
the beginning it was really,really challenging because a lot
of the people or the agencieswho are skeptical about
jellyfish, they don't think it'sa thing here in Georgia, but
Georgia has an advantage overother states because here in
Georgia, jellyfish is a statefishery so meaning, you know,
(25:40):
it's legal to harvest and it'slegal to commercialize and
process jellyfish. So we startedworking with this and you know,
apply for funding, we're reallyblessed to receive funding from
the United States Department ofAgriculture through its NIFA
program. That's where everythingreally started to exponentially
grow, I would say. You know, wewe had more resources to do
(26:01):
research and understand moreabout jellyfish, collagen, and
how we could create productsthat will have thickening
properties. A lot of thecollagen-based ingredients that
you see in the food industry areused to provide thickness.
That's not always the case. Insome applications, thickness is
not required. So we were likeworking on understanding at what
(26:23):
points this collagen willprovide thickness and what
conditions this collagen willnot provide thickness and so we
are currently looking at ways toproduce collagen peptides as
well. I don't know if you'veheard, you know, some of the
collagen peptide supplements?
Jordan Powers (26:39):
I keep hearing it in headlines and in all the
trending articles.
Kevin Mis Solval (26:42):
Yeah.
Emily Davenport (26:43):
Uh-huh, yup.
Kevin Mis Solval (26:44):
Most of those collagen peptides supplements
are coming from mammaliancollagen, meaning bovine and
porcine sources. Now we'retrying to introduce a new
collagen source, which isjellyfish. The advantages that
we have with jellyfish is thatjellyfish is one of the few
marine species whose biomass isgoing to increase exponentially
(27:05):
in the next few years. And,arguably, it's due to global
warming, unfortunately. Oceansare getting warmer, are getting
more acidic, and that's justkilling a lot of the jellyfish
predators. Across the globe, notonly here in coastal Georgia,
there is, it's been reportedthat more jellyfish blooms have
(27:27):
been spotted, meaning all thebiomass of jellyfish is
increasing. The question is,what are we going to do with
that excess biomass ofjellyfish? Are we gonna do
anything? Are we just gonna youknow, let it rot in our beaches?
And speaking of that, if you goto Savannah, January, February,
(27:48):
you will see a lot of jellyfishwash off, you know, on the
beaches in that area. You willbe amazed seeing how much
jellyfish biomass is there. Sodefinitely there is a good
supply of jellyfish. When westarted working with this
project several years ago, wespoke with several companies
(28:09):
interested in commercializingall these technologies. One of
the questions that we are askedall the time is how much
jellyfish is in the ocean,right? Obviously, that's not my
area of expertise. I'm not amarine biologist, but we were
really curious about, you know,how much jellyfish is in the
ocean? So what I did, we werelooking for other jellyfish
(28:34):
fisheries in North America. Andturns out, we found that there
is a jellyfish fishery inMexico. Gulf of Santa Clara has
the largest jellyfish fishery inthe United States. So we're
lucky enough, you know, to makecontact with them, and they
invited us for their harvest in2022 last year, so I took my PhD
(28:57):
student who is, you know,leading the project, in charge
of the project. So we went thereto Gulf of Santa Clara, in
Mexico. I was fascinated becausethat fisherman town is in the
middle of a desert. It was anincredible, incredible
experience. And we werefascinated about the amount of
(29:18):
jellyfish we saw there. Lastyear, they processed 500,000
tons
Emily Davenport (29:25):
Wow.
Kevin Mis Solval (29:26):
of jellyfish in that one town operation.
Emily Davenport (29:29):
Wow.
Kevin Mis Solval (29:30):
So, and they say they're seeing more
jellyfish, you know, every year.
We suspect that probably samequantities are going to be found
here in Georgia. It's the samespecies, same type of jellyfish
with you know, great potentialfor becoming a really good raw
material for collagen-basedproducts. Now we're looking at,
you know, studying,understanding more about the
(29:50):
technical aspects of theseproducts. You know, we filed for
a patent a couple of years agowith the University of Georgia
Innovation Gateway. So we'reexpecting that and of course, as
a researcher, we're publishingthe data in scientific journals.
We want to share the knowledgeas well with the world because
jellyfish is one of the fewmarine species who more people
(30:12):
are experimenting with acrossthe globe, not only in the
United States, but also inEurope and Asia. They're
recognizing the potentialeconomic opportunities that may
come with these marine species.
That's kind of, you know, wherewe are right now. My PhD
student, Peter Chiarelli, who isleading the project, received a
(30:36):
USDA predoctoral, NIFApredoctoral fellowship, to work
on jellyfish. And thatfellowship is a prestigious one,
one of the most prestigiousawards that a PhD student in
food science can receive. So I'mso glad, you know, so thankful
for that and all the supportthat we have received from
(30:57):
federal government, stategovernment, and also industry
and, of course, University ofGeorgia.
Jordan Powers (31:03):
How exciting, both for the program and for
this PhD student who really getsto spearhead this project and
make it happen. And we knowwe've covered over the years,
several articles on thejellyfish project. So we'll make
sure to link those in the shownotes for our listeners, so that
they can learn a little bitmore.
Emily Davenport (31:18):
Mm-hmm.
Kevin Mis Solval (31:19):
Excellent.
Jordan Powers (31:20):
So one of the techniques or processes that
you've mentioned several timesnow is spray drying. We got a
little bit of an inside scoop,because last time we were in
Griffin, we got to tour FoodPIC,and see kind of the spray drying
technology in action. But forour listeners who might not be
familiar, can you explain alittle bit more about what spray
drying is?
Kevin Mis Solval (31:37):
Spray drying is a technology that was
introduced more than a centuryago, by the dairy industry. They
had a challenge on making shelfstable milk, they were producing
a lot of milk, but they didn'trealize that they didn't have
enough capacity to, you know,refrigerate all that milk. So
they came up with an idea ofusing hot air to dehydrate, you
(31:59):
know, milk. So spray drying isthat technology that uses, most
of the time hot air, and thathot air will get in contact with
spray product, you see thissmall droplets getting in
contact with hot air. And thatinstantly will dehydrate the
product. And so you can collectpowders. So it's a technology to
produce powders, because it'sversatility, its effectiveness,
(32:22):
and cost effectiveness, mostimportantly, it's widely used
not only in the food industry,but also pharmaceutical
industries, and also chemicalindustry. And now by the
material industry as well. Soyou can have you know, food
powders, shelf stable or withlow moisture content. These
powders will last years. Andthat's why it is a technology
(32:46):
that is widely adopted bydifferent industries.
Emily Davenport (32:49):
That's really cool.
Jordan Powers (32:51):
I remember it looked like it was snowing the
time when we got to see itbecause I think it was a milk
product.
Emily Davenport (32:55):
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Powers (32:55):
And I'm like, oh, it just looks like a little
chamber of snow.
Emily Davenport (32:59):
Just making some snow, hot snow.
Jordan Powers (33:04):
When talking about innovation, right, of food
products, you mentioned the UGAFood Process Innovation and
Commercialization Centerearlier, or FoodPIC, as we
commonly call it, because that'sa mouthful, that I can't believe
I got through on one take.
Emily Davenport (33:17):
Yeah, I'm impressed. I was like, wait,
what is that place you weretalking about? Oh, yeah.
Everyone (33:21):
[laughter]
Jordan Powers (33:23):
Can you tell us more about FoodPIC and how you
partner with Georgia foodbusinesses specifically?
Kevin Mis Solval (33:28):
You know, when I was hired five years ago, part
of my job was to work withFoodPIC. At the time I worked
with Dr. Kirk Kealy was theFoodPIC director. So we
conducted different projects.
One of them was the pomegranateproject that I previously
explained. And I also washelping Dr. Kealy's team to work
with some companies and developeither new food processing
(33:53):
operations or, you know,implementing or optimizing food
processing operations for aspecific client food because
clients, domestic clients thatat the time, they needed
optimization of spray dryingoperations. So that's, you know,
some of the work I help with inother areas. I also help with
product development approaches.
(34:17):
So we had a project with acompany that was trying to
develop products from cornprocessing waste streams. So
we're looking at waste streamsand trying to develop spray
dried food ingredients fromthose waste streams. That's kind
of, you know, the work that wehave done with FoodPIC and I
served as the interim directorof FoodPIC in 2021 to 2022. We
(34:41):
worked with other companies andhelp companies to develop
products and also contact shelflife studies among other things.
So FoodPIC is always busy.
Everyone (34:52):
[laughter]
Jordan Powers (34:52):
It is. Well, and especially that work with the
industry byproducts that you'vejust talked about with FoodPIC
and then previously with withsome of the other projects
you've worked on, what anamazing way to promote
sustainability, to reduce foodwaste. You know, again, we
talked about kind of thetrifecta of people that are
benefiting from these researchproducts. But at the end of the
day, I mean, the environment isbenefiting as well, which is
(35:12):
really exciting.
Emily Davenport (35:13):
Yeah, it's really great. Getting creative
with Georgia food commodities,too, which is also great to
stick close to home. Can youtell us more about what Smart
Food Processing is? And how youuse it in your research?
Kevin Mis Solval (35:27):
Right, thank you for asking that question.
Having worked in the industry inanother, in a completely
different industry to the foodindustry, I saw a lot of the
really nice technologies thatother industries are using to
improve processes, you know,really nice gadgets,
state-of-the-art technologies.
And I was fascinated by it. Andyou know, at the time, of
(35:48):
course, obviously, my hands weretied, I couldn't really explore
those technologies, because Ihad one job and that was running
the spray dryers and leadingthat team, and then being in now
in an academic environment,where I have the opportunity to
explore those ideas, explore,you know, how do we improve
current food processingoperations using modern
(36:12):
technologies? And unfortunately,you know, food industry has
lagged into adopting other, youknow, technologies that are
being very effective in otherindustries. And some of those
technologies are, like, youknow, thermal imaging, for
example. That's a specificexample that I can share with
you. Thermal imagingtechnologies are kind of a, you
know, well studied in otherfields, but not really in the
(36:35):
food processing environment.
Part of the work that we aredoing is using thermal cameras
to get thermal images of foodprocessing operations. So we can
see a different physicalphenomena, especially heat
transfer, energy transferphenomena, with these cameras.
(36:55):
It turns out that some of thesedevices, they used to be
extremely expensive 10, 15 yearsago. Nowadays, they are like in
the hundreds. So we, one projectthat we had funded with the
Central for Product Safety, welooked at using thermal cameras
that can be connected with thesmartphones, those cameras can
be easily used and operated byfood operators to look at the
(37:19):
temperatures of fresh produce.
That was a really nice,interesting project. Nobody had
thought about it and we were,like, evaluating the
effectiveness of using thosecameras and making
recommendations about whetherthose cameras could collect, you
know, reliable data that couldbe compared with our regular
thermometers, or thermocouples,regular temperature recorders.
And turns out, they're even moreeffective, because, you know,
(37:42):
you can collect temperature datain real time, and with
non-contact approaches. So yeah,and there are older
technologies, as well as smarttechnologies, that can be used
to improve our food operations.
And that's why I think now, oneof the areas that my group is
(38:03):
focusing on is to how do weadopt all these technologies
that are out there and implementthose technologies for the
benefit of the food industry?
Emily Davenport (38:12):
We've heard you're focusing on developing
simulations to optimize foodprocessing conditions. So for
our audience who doesn't, mightnot have computer science
backgrounds, tell us more aboutwhat's involved. And how often
do you get to play with virtualreality?
Kevin Mis Solval (38:29):
Right, that's a good question. Computer
simulations are cool tools, Iwould say, that I started
working with when I was in gradschool. In fact, on my PhD
thesis was about computersimulations of spray drying
operations. A lot of theprocesses that we currently use
in the food industry, we don'tunderstand them really well, in
(38:51):
terms of the physical phenomenathat is happening. With computer
simulations, you know, thesesimulations do is they help us
to gain a better understandingof the physical phenomena,
meaning, heat, mass transfer,energy transfer, all these
things that physicists andengineers like to, you know,
study. And the main reason forthat is because we wanted to
(39:13):
gain all that knowledge so wecan improve that operation. We
can improve not only theoperation, but also improve the
type of products that are beingprocessed with that operation.
In the case of spray drying, thework that I did was to
understand how this hot air wasactually interacting with all
these products that were beingdried. So by understanding that,
(39:36):
we could design betteroperations, so the product, the
resulting food powders that cameout of the spray dryer, were
higher quality and morenutritious, and of course safe.
So that's one of the ways, youknow, we use computer
simulations. And the, anotheradvantage of using computer
simulations is also that they'remore cost effective than,
(39:59):
compared to conductingexperimental work in the field,
so with computer simulation, we,you know, simulate something
that will happen in reality,right? So we simulate a spray
drying operation, for example.
So we can simulate differentconditions or have different
assumptions. And we'll have thespecific answers. So that
definitely helped me speed upthe, you know, R&D process. And
(40:24):
that's definitely beneficial.
And speaking of virtual reality,so, I started working with
virtual reality a couple ofyears ago, because we had a
problem with showing our FoodPICfacilities, actually. So we get
clients from all over the, youknow, the United States wanted
(40:44):
to see what kind of equipment wehad in FoodPIC. And what, how
our facilities look like. So wecame up with the idea, oh, why
don't we 3D scan the facilities,and we share that scan with our
potential clients? And that'swhere we started working with
virtual reality. And we getreally excited about the quality
(41:05):
of the scans that we couldcollect, and then the type of
tools that the client needed toobserve all those, you know, 3D
scans, these virtual realities.
And it turns out, that it has alot of applications to improve
food safety operations, foodprocessing operations. For
example, if you are in corporateheadquarters, let's say Chicago,
and you have facilities inGeorgia, and you want to see how
(41:28):
your current facilities looklike, you can definitely you
know, access some of these 3Dmodels of your facilities, and
observe how the current statusof your facility look like. We
have done 3D scanned severalcommercial food processing
facilities over the years. Thathas helped a lot the clients to
improve their operations. Sowe're really fascinated by that,
(41:50):
and that's a couple of examplesthat how we have used that
technology to improveoperations.
Emily Davenport (41:57):
Cool, wow.
Jordan Powers (41:58):
It is. It's incredible to think about, you
know, obviously, spray dryingdoesn't look like what it did
centuries ago. But it's amazingto talk about a technology that
has been around for centuries,and then all of this new
technology really just comingtogether. And again, I still, it
just blows my mind that at theend of the day, when you pull
that product off the shelf andgo to check out at the grocery
store, I guarantee you for mostpeople, these are not the
(42:19):
thoughts that probably gothrough their head. Grocery
shopping must be a lot differentfor you.
Everyone (42:23):
[laughter]
Emily Davenport (42:23):
Yeah, right?
Jordan Powers (42:27):
But we have, we've covered so much ground
today, from some of these newtechnologies to the age-old
technologies to a focus onGeorgia commodities that turn
around and impact the world.
What have we missed?
Kevin Mis Solval (42:39):
I just want to say I'm so blessed and grateful
to have my current position.
Like I said before, I don'tremember having so much fun, you
know, in my job. It's definitelya privilege to have the
opportunity to work forUniversity of Georgia as a
faculty member with a great,great, great team. I couldn't
have achieved what I haveachieved without obviously the
support of my family, mymentors, my department, an
(43:02):
incredible department head thatis always supportive. He is
providing some resources for usto explore in other areas of
research. And also the supportfrom our college, College of
Agricultural and EnvironmentalSciences. And the University of
Georgia and of course, theUniversity of Georgia Griffin
Campus. I feel that I'm soblessed. I'm so happy here to
(43:25):
spend more time with mystudents, my staff, it's a
privilege to mentor all theseyoung people as well, I
definitely enjoy working withthem, I'm so happy when they
they publish an article or theythey receive an award. And that
makes me really happy. Thatbrings me joy, definitely more
than you know, publishing anarticle, it, the impact that my
(43:46):
work is having on other people'slives, especially the young
ones. So I'm fully dedicated totraining the next generation of
food scientists, foodinnovators, very positive that a
lot of my current students, theywill join industry, federal, or
state government, you know, inkey positions in the next few
(44:06):
years. So, and that's the legacythat I want to leave behind. And
I appreciate the opportunitythat you're providing me the
platform to share some of myaccomplishments with the general
public. And we're always open,you know, to conversations and
willing to learn more about howwe can help. That's our dilemma
(44:26):
in the lab, how we can help. Howwe can help our industry, how we
can help our community. Alwaysthe question I ask myself and my
team, how we can help.
Jordan Powers (44:38):
I can't think of a more perfect or inspirational
way to end this conversation.
Emily Davenport (44:42):
Yeah.
Jordan Powers (44:42):
So, Kevin, thank you so much for inviting us out
to the Griffin Campus and takingthe time today.
Kevin Mis Solval (44:46):
Thank you so much.
Emily Davenport (44:47):
Thank you. Yay!
Sound Effect (44:51):
[music]
Emily Davenport (44:51):
Yay. Thanks for listening to cultivating
curiosity, a podcast produced bythe UGA College of Agricultural
and Environmental Sciences Aspecial thanks to Mason
McClintock for our music andsound effects. Find more
episodes wherever you get yourpodcasts.
[music]
Emily Davenport (00:01):
Welcome to Cultivating Curiosity, where we
get down and dirty with theexperts on all the ways science
and agriculture touch our livesfrom what we eat to how we live.
I'm Emily Davenport.
Jordan Powers (00:12):
And I'm Jordan Powers, and we're from the
University of Georgia's Collegeof Agricultural and
Environmental Sciences.
Sound Effect (00:19):
[chime]
Jordan Powers (00:21):
While most episodes of Cultivating
Curiosity are recorded in ourAthens, Georgia studio, a lot of
the amazing work that happens atCAES and UGA Extension occurs
across the state. Today, we areat the UGA Griffin Campus, about
30 miles south of Atlanta, withKevin Mis Solval, associate
professor in the Department ofFood Science and Technology.
(00:41):
Kevin, thanks for having us outto Griffin today.
Kevin Mis Solval (00:44):
Thank you very much. Thank you for the
opportunity.
Jordan Powers (00:46):
Absolutely. We are really excited to dive into
this conversation and, spoiler,I think Emily's extra excited on
some of the topics we'll covertoday.
Sound Effect (00:52):
[chime]
Jordan Powers (00:55):
Before we dive into his background, we got to
peek into Kevin's lab inGriffin, where he had built an
entire miniaturized version of apeach processing line, where
peaches are washed and packedbefore distribution. This
project is funded by the GeorgiaDepartment of Agriculture and is
investigating ways to improve onthe washing and packing process
in order to minimize bacteriabefore the peaches make their
(01:17):
way to suppliers nationwide.
Kevin Mis Solval (01:19):
So the equipment that we're looking
directly at is our simulatedpacking, washing and packing
equipment for peaches, turns outthat there is an issue with
cleaning some of the rollersthat are in this type of
equipment. So what we're tryingto do is to explore better ways
(01:40):
to clean these rollers usingtechnologies that we are
developing in my lab. And sowith those designs, we are going
to be able to clean anddisinfect these commonly used
rollers more effectively. And sothe intention of building this
pilot plant line is to mimic theconditions that you would see in
(02:04):
real packing operations offruits and vegetables. So as a
process engineer, I like tobuild things, I like to study
things, I like to understand howthings work, and how do we make
things better for the foodindustry in general?
Jordan Powers (02:21):
Absolutely. And some of that research is
happening behind a computer. Butsome of it's happening by
building a processing line.
Kevin Mis Solval (02:26):
Exactly, exactly. Yeah. That's how you
understanding how you teach yourstudents as well to understand
the processes that you want toimprove.
Jordan Powers (02:33):
We took some photos of the mini processing
line that we'll share in theshow notes. In the meantime,
let's get back to the interview.
Sound Effect (02:39):
[chime]
Jordan Powers (02:41):
Can you tell us a little bit about your background
and how you got interested infood science?
Kevin Mis Solval (02:46):
Born and raised in Guatemala, Central
America. Growing up in adeveloping country, I was
fascinated with some of thetechnologies that I saw during
my especially high school years.
I was fascinated with the waysugar cane is made. So Guatemala
is one of the largest sugar caneproducers in the world. So when
(03:07):
I went to high school there, Ihad the opportunity to intern at
the largest sugarcane mill inGuatemala, where I was
fascinated about, you know, allthese pieces of equipment, large
pieces of equipment that wereused to make sugarcane. And
that's how I was reallyinterested in learning more
about food processing as an areastudy was I wanted to become a
(03:29):
process engineer. The only wayyou could have done it back 20,
25 years ago in Guatemala was tobecome a chemical engineer. I
didn't want to study chemicalengineering per se. I wanted to
study something more relatedcloser to foods, to food
processing. So it turns out thatin Guatemala at the time there
(03:50):
were not really any foodscience, food processing
schools. So I was looking at away to pursue a bachelor's
degree in food, food science,food engineering outside
Guatemala. So I had theopportunity to go to Honduras
and study Food Science andTechnology in Honduras, where I
met incredible people from allover Latin America. So the place
(04:12):
that I went was called ZamoranoUniversity. During those years,
I learned about not only thedifferent cultures about Latin
America, from Latin America,from Mexico all over to Chile,
and I had incredible mentors,incredible professors who had
PhDs in food processing, anyarea of possible area in
(04:33):
agriculture right away. So whenI was a senior in Zamorano in
Honduras, I had the opportunityto come to the Louisiana State
University as an intern for fourmonths. So I came in and I
interned in Dr. SubramaniamSathivel's lab. We conducted a
project with transformingcatfish oil into biodiesel.
Emily Davenport (04:54):
Wow.
Kevin Mis Solval (04:54):
So it was really interesting, you know,
that was a very interestingproject and I was really
fascinated by it. You know, whenI was young and dumb, probably,
you know, wasn't reallyinterested too much in science.
By the way, I never ever thoughtabout going to become a
professor, you know, ever. Allthat I want to do, you know, get
a college degree, back inGuatemala, of course, you know,
(05:15):
get a college degree and get ajob and maybe start a family and
I probably didn't have like, bigdreams. All that I wanted to do
was, like, work hard, focus onmy work one day at a time. So
um, when I came to LSU for thatinternship, my major professor
at the time offered me to returnas a master's student. One of
(05:35):
the limitations that I had atthe time was that my English was
not good. So I had to improve ita lot. So I wanted to come back
to the United States and get adegree. My goal was to return
one day to Latin America andwork in Guatemala or any country
in Central America, that's allthat I wanted to do. Anyways, I
came back to LSU for my master'sin Food Science and Technology,
(05:57):
which I completed in 2011. Sothen after that, again, my major
professor asked me to stay forPhD program. But this time in
Biological Engineering. I had tothink about a little bit whether
I wanted to pursue that becausethat was going to be like four
more years of study. And so in amajor that I wasn't completely
familiar with, I had to take alot of courses in engineering
(06:19):
and do more challenging studies.
But I was having a good time atLSU. And in school, and I had a
lot of friends and we were doinggreat job, interesting research.
And I decided to continue onthat path. So you four years
later, I completed my PhD inBiological Engineering. I didn't
know what to do actually wasmore maybe inclined to join
industry. But at the same time,I had something inside of me
(06:41):
that I wanted to mentor youngpeople. And I had extensively
published a lot of scientificarticles regarding process
optimizations, food processingoperations, developing a high
value food ingredients. I talkedto my major advisor, and he
recommended me maybe to improvemy teaching skills, because in
grad school, I never had theopportunity to teach a complete
(07:02):
course. So I took a teaching jobat University of Holy Cross in
New Orleans, Louisiana, where Itaught food processing, physics,
and advanced physics courses forundergrads. And I definitely
loved that job. Definitely likeit. You know, I enjoy working
with young people. We were likeexperimenting, brainstorming all
the time. And after two years, Ifelt that I wanted to include a
(07:25):
research component in my career.
So I was looking for positionsin both academia and in
industry. So academic jobs,especially faculty jobs, take a
lot longer. The interviewprocess, it's about a year or
so. But industry, the hiringprocess is a lot faster. I got a
job on nanotechnology company inDayton, Ohio, where I was a
(07:49):
process engineer and I was incharge of managing the spray
drying operations for thecompany. We're doing a little
nano sized products for energystorage applications. So it was
a fascinating job, I mean, Idefinitely learned more about
material science, I only workedwith material scientist and
material engineers. And it turnsout that the technology that I
(08:10):
was in charge of which by theway, is my area of expertise,
spray drying, nobody in thematerial world knows too much
about it. I mean, it's atechnology that is widely known
in food and pharmaceuticalindustries, but it's been
introduced now to other fields,because, you know, its
versatility and costeffectiveness. So I was in
(08:30):
charge of a big group ofengineers, were doing all kinds
of products, production andresearch. And I really liked
that job. Unfortunately, Iwasn't working with foods. And
most of the work that I wasdoing, I wasn't really doing too
much work outside thatparticular technology, which in
a way I enjoyed because itdefinitely allowed me to go a
lot deeper in understanding thattechnology, and especially large
(08:52):
scales, and we're doing a lot ofproduction scales. So when my
current position was advertised,I got a call from my major
professor back from LSU, right?
And he said, hey, Kevin, youshould apply to this position,
you're the perfect candidate forit. And I wasn't really
convinced, because I knowUniversity of Georgia has a
great, great reputation,especially in Food Science and
Technology field. And I waslike, there is no way I'm gonna
(09:14):
get that job. But I'll do mybest and I will interview, I
will apply. You never know aboutthese positions, right? So I
remember it was February 2018.
And a month later, the chair ofFood Science and Technology
actually called me, Dr. RakeshSingh and offered me the
position and I was definitelyyou know, surprised. I couldn't
(09:34):
believe it. I couldn't believeit. Fast forward, I joined the
program in the fall of 2018.
I've been here in the program onthe Griffin Campus for five
years now. I don't rememberhaving a better time in my life
than I'm having it today. It's agreat opportunity. I'm so
blessed. I'm so grateful to havethis position. So that's how'd I
get here, you know.
Jordan Powers (09:55):
And on top of that, we heard that just three
weeks ago, you said you receiveda promotion to associate
professor, so congratulations.
Kevin Mis Solval (10:02):
Thank you very much, appreciate it.
Emily Davenport (10:04):
What an exciting journey. And it's great
to have people looking out foryou to hook you up with a
position like, well, at leastput the position in your line of
sight, to have your professor...
Kevin Mis Solval (10:14):
Sure. Yeah.
Jordan Powers (10:15):
That mentor sounds like a solid mentor.
Emily Davenport (10:17):
Yeah, yeah
Kevin Mis Solval (10:19):
It is. It is definitely,
Emily Davenport (10:21):
That's awesome.
We know that you have an 80%research, 20% UGA Extension
appointment. So what does theday to day look like for you?
Kevin Mis Solval (10:29):
Having a lot of research appointment requires
me to spend a lot of time doingresearch. That means reading
articles, brainstorming.
Unfortunately, I don't work toomuch in the lab doing the
experimental analysis and all ofthat. I did that during the
first couple of years that I gothere. But I spent that time to
train my students, train mytechnicians, my senior
scientist, so they can do it nowfor me. So they understand every
(10:52):
time that I instruct them what Iwant them to do, they will do
it. So now my day looks likemore towards reading research
articles, writing a lot. So Iwould say 90% of my day is
writing. It's writing, readingand reading, understanding, what
is the current research in foodscience? How does it look like?
How do we implement the newknowledge into our research so
(11:16):
we can expand the scientificknowledge in our field? So it
takes a lot of time, takes a lotof effort, because what happens
most of the time is I get easilydistracted by many things, many
ideas. We may have like 10 goodideas, excellent ideas, but then
we had to make a choice aboutselecting the best one, not even
(11:38):
the best two, the best one. Soyour chances of getting funded
and published in the world arehigher if you focus on maybe one
or two ideas. So that's how myday looks like doing a lot of
research. Mentoring students,which I enjoy a lot working with
young people, sometimes theyhave a background in food
(11:59):
processing, food science. Mostof the time is very limited. So
it's my job to actually trainthem. And that takes time, as
well. It takes time, takeseffort from both sides. And I'm
very happy and glad to have hadgood grad students.
Sound Effect (12:14):
[chime]
Emily Davenport (12:16):
Kevin does a great job mentoring his
students. His doctoral student,Peter Chiarelli, just received a
pre-doctoral fellowship fromUSDA NIFA. For his research,
we'll add a link to the story inthe show notes for you to learn
more. By the way, USDA NIFA isthe United States Department of
Agriculture's National Instituteof Food and Agriculture. They
(12:37):
provide leadership and fundingfor programs that advance
agriculture-related sciences.
We'll link their website in theshow notes too.
Sound Effect (12:46):
[chime]
Kevin Mis Solval (12:46):
Like I said, most of my time is dedicated to
doing research and doing a lotof experimental work, planning
and brainstorming and publishingthat work. In my case, it
doesn't really matter how muchwork we do in the lab unless we
publish it right. So we'llpublish it in top journals,
because we want to improve therecognition of our department in
(13:09):
the scientific field. So that'spart of my job to make sure that
the work that we do here is highquality, is impactful, and
expands the current sitescientific knowledge. By doing
that I'm also dedicated to trainstudents, like I said before,
not only students, but alsovisiting scientists,
technicians, and my whole team.
I collaborate with other facultymembers here in our program and
(13:30):
also in other programs acrossthe United States. And now I'm
starting to collaborate withmore people outside the US, like
people from Thailand, researcherfrom Brazil, and I think that's
the second phase now of mycareer here at UGA.
Jordan Powers (13:44):
Absolutely, keeping that impact right here
on the Griffin Campus, but thenalso taking it across the globe,
which is really exciting.
Emily Davenport (13:51):
Mm-hmm.
Kevin Mis Solval (13:51):
Yes, yes, absolutely. I do have an
Extension appointment as well. Iteach some workshops, and also
in our department like thebetter Process Control School,
where I also work with foodcompanies, train food personnel
in the US and also overseas. Forexample, I went to my home
country last year in a USaid-funded project and so I
(14:15):
helped a local company inGuatemala developing food
products that are actually beingcommercialized as we speak. It
was a fascinating experience,and sometimes these companies
back in developing countriesdon't have the resources or the
knowledge to develop good foodsthat are healthy, nutritious,
and of course safe. Those arelike the three key areas that I
(14:36):
like to address every time thatI'm assisting or helping a food
company developing a newproduct.
Sound Effect (14:40):
[chime]
Jordan Powers (14:41):
When Kevin references US aid, he's talking
about USAID, which is the UnitedStates Agency for International
Development. We'll add a link inthe show notes for you.
Sound Effect (14:54):
[chime]
Kevin Mis Solval (14:54):
More recently, again in my Extension work, I
went to Uzbekistan to assist acompany optimizing food
processing operations. So thecompany is one of the largest
exporters of fruits andvegetables in Uzbekistan. They
had issues with processoptimization. So when they're,
(15:14):
you know, train some of theirpersonnel to look after, how do
we improve operations? What arethe key areas of looking at
fresh fruits and vegetables, howdo, they can, you know, improve
those operations by using someof the technologies I'm using
here in United States. So thatwas a great, great experience.
Again, that's another projectwith USAID funded program, I'm
(15:36):
happy that my feedback has beenrecognized not only in the US,
but now outside the UnitedStates.
Jordan Powers (15:42):
A lot of that impact, like you mentioned, you
you share in those journalarticles, which is something
fantastic. And I know yourfaculty profile has quite a few
of those listed. So we'll besure to link that in the show
notes if people really want todive in and learn more about the
research that you're completing.
Emily Davenport (15:56):
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Powers (15:57):
You mentioned your students and your grad
students, what are some of theprojects that they're currently
working on? Or is there, arethere some that you can share
with us?
Kevin Mis Solval (16:04):
Well, we have a bunch of different projects.
And that's one of the beautiesof being in academic work,
right? So we can develop our ownideas. But at the same time, we
have had to diversify a lot. Myresearch, which at some point,
I'll try to cut some of the workthat we're currently doing. But
when I joined UGA, five yearsago, we started working with a
(16:25):
project with Georgia Grownpomegranate, most of these
pomegranates are sold in thefresh market, right? So we saw
an opportunity to develop highvalue for ingredients and see
how we can help the industry todiversify a little bit and also
understand how they can utilizebyproducts meaning peels and
seeds, we look at theantioxidants or their
phytochemicals in pomegranates,and we were fascinated to find
(16:48):
that pomegranate and pomegranatepeels are incredible sources of
antioxidants that may have somehealth benefits. One of the
products that we conducted wasto extract pectin from
pomegranate peels and extractalso the antioxidants from those
peels and also from the juiceand to encapsulate that and
produce a powder product thatcould have both vaccines and
(17:09):
antioxidants. That's a highvalue product. We conducted the
feasibility studies. And most ofthis work is published in
scientific journals. As part ofthis project as well, I
collaborated with Dr. JinruChen, who was the main the main
PI for the project. So she waslooking at food safety aspects
of these compounds. And it turnsout that some of these compounds
(17:30):
have strong antimicrobialproperties. And what's
fascinating, so you know, that'ssomething that we didn't know
before. That's how we startedhelping local growers in Georgia
with this new project. So onanother project that we're
currently working on is withsatsumas. Satsuma mandarins is
an emerging crop here inGeorgia. One of the challenges
for the satsuma industry is thatthere is a lot of Satsuma trees
(17:53):
that have been planted recently,and the harvesting window is
very short. So most of thatharvest is intended for fresh
market. And it's expected thatall that to satsuma mandarin
production, it's going tosaturate the market in the
coming years. And now we'reexploring alternatives to
utilize the excess fruit or thesecond grade fruit. So we're
(18:13):
looking at producing satsuma usepowders used in spray drying.
And we have found that satsumause powders are a great, great
source of vitamin C. Theadvantage of having those
products is that those productsare shelf stable, and also can
be utilized in different foodapplications. But not only food
applications, but also incosmetics, in other applications
(18:34):
where a natural ingredient isrequired. So we're excited about
that. Because it'sGeorgia-grown, it's a natural
product, and may have a lot ofpotential in the coming years. A
lot of the work that we do in mylab is feasibility studies. One
of the main questions is, can wemake this? Can we make that? So
we start with that question,right? I prefer focusing on
(18:55):
Georgia-grown commoditiespomegranate and satsuma
mandarins. And obviously, wehave had some success, and
especially with one of thecommodities that very few people
have heard of, which isjellyfish. And I've been so
fortunate to have a lot ofsuccess on that project. But
like I said before, and I thinkI'm gonna explain a little bit
more about what we're doing withjellyfish. But a lot of the work
(19:18):
that we do, again, is to dofeasibility studies, and also
how to identify economicopportunities for our growers
here. So pros, things that theynever thought of in, like,
satsuma use powders, how theycan make a profit producing
those type of products. Theyalready have the food, they
already have the raw materials,but they may not have the
knowledge of how to make, youknow, to get through that
(19:41):
process of developing these newproducts. At the University of
Georgia Griffin campus, we havegreat resources. We also have
the Food Product InnovationCenter. I work with them a lot
in developing andcommercializing some of these
ideas that we originally startedin my lab.
Jordan Powers (19:58):
What, and we'll definitely talk about FoodPIC
later, because that that couldbe a whole episode on its own.
I'm just stuck on what anamazing opportunity both for
your students to have theexperience of checking the
feasibility of products thatthey will eventually see, what
an amazing opportunity for theproducers who are finding a
whole new revenue stream intheir production. And then the
(20:19):
end consumer who, at the end ofthe day, is benefiting from
these products. I mean, it isimpactful on so many different
levels kind of throughout thisprocess from that first question
of "can we do this?" to seeing avitamin C supplement on a shelf.
That's that's pretty powerful.
Emily Davenport (20:33):
Yeah, I think it's really cool the creativity
that goes into thinking about,what else can we do with this
besides just consuming a rawfruit product or something like
that. And I love the creativityof the jellyfish. And that is
not something that we think ofas a food item at all. So can
you tell us more about your workwith the jellyfish
Kevin Mis Solval (20:55):
Sure, yeah, wow
Emily Davenport (20:55):
And your success there?
Kevin Mis Solval (20:57):
I think that by far one of the most
successful projects that wecurrently have in my program,
well, I think we started workingwith jellyfish by a stroke of
luck, I would say. Back at LSU.
I worked a lot with seafoodbyproducts, and how to develop
high value products from usingor utilizing seafood byproducts.
(21:19):
So I worked with catfish,catfish skin, catfish oil. I
work with crawfish, crawfishbyproduct. I work with shrimp,
oysters. Louisiana has a richhistory of seafood processing
and seafood innovation. So whenI came to the University of
Georgia, and I joined theprogram, in the first month into
the job I got a call from ToriStivers, who is the seafood
(21:42):
specialist for Georgia Sea Grantand Marine Extension. And she
called me she said, hey, Kevin,I saw an email of your hiring
and I saw that you graduatedfrom LSU, and I know LSU has a
strong seafood technologyprogram. And by the way, are you
familiar with jellyfish and anypotential uses for a jellyfish?
(22:03):
And I was like, what? Jellyfish?
Everyone (22:07):
[laughter]
Kevin Mis Solval (22:09):
I never heard about jellyfish in my life, and
can you explain a little bitmore about that? So she was kind
enough to meet me and turns outthat at the time, the Georgia
jellyfish industry wasstruggling. And I didn't know
there was actually a Georgiajellyfish industry. So the
(22:32):
Georgia jellyfish industry,turns out that, you know, they
catch jellyfish spring, springmonths of the year and salt it,
dry it, and then export it toAsian countries. Now, that's a
technology that is very, veryold, salting, drying jellyfish,
it's been used for centuries,and there is nothing new there.
(22:53):
The challenge that the industryhas, or had at the time, is
that, you know, one of the mainbuyers of salted, dried
jellyfishes was China. So Chinawas imposing a lot of import
taxes on these salted driedjellyfish from the United
States. So they wanted tointroduce jellyfish products
into the local market, meaningUnited States, right? But the
(23:13):
challenge is, how do we convincedomestic consumers to eat
salted, dried jellyfish? And sothat's where I came in with
ideas about commercializing, youknow, jellyfish-based products.
And I said, well, seems likejellyfish is a great commodity
and has a great potential, and Itold Tori Stivers to, you know,
(23:34):
send me some samples, I'll lookat it in my lab, explore what it
has and what we can do. Sureenough, they were kind enough to
send me samples of jellyfish, sowe're looking at different
aspects and nutritional profile,and we found that cannonball
jellyfish or jelly balls are agreat source of collagen.
Sound Effect (23:53):
[chime]
Emily Davenport (23:54):
The cannonball jellyfish is a harmless, dare we
say cute? round jellyfish,that's also known as a jelly
ball. The species is Stomolophusmeleagris. We'll add a link in
the show notes where you canlearn more about these rotund
jellies.
Sound Effect (24:09):
[chime]
Kevin Mis Solval (24:11):
When we discovered that, it was like an
aha! moment for me. I'm like,wow, it is collagen. And I knew
about the new collagen trendsthat are happening now in the
market. And then I said, well,you know, these could be
definitely a really cool rawmaterial for making
collagen-based products and theywere a little bit skeptical. You
know, there's some people, oh,we wanted to do you know, you
(24:32):
probably just freeze jellyfishand have frozen jellyfish and
sell them to the market.
Although that's a great idea,the challenge with that is we
still need to convince thedomestic consumers to eat that
jellyfish, to buy the jellyfish,right? So a lot of people are
still skeptical about eatingjellyfish. But we also found
that when you provide a powderproduct to a consumer, that
consumer is more willing to trythat new product compared to if
(24:56):
you give the whole piece of thatcommodity or that product to the
consumer. That's how everythingstarted. We started working on
that project, discovered thecollagen in jellyfish, applied
for funding because that'sanother thing that I do. A lot
of the work that we currentlydo, we need to find sponsors
from the federal government orstate government or industry to
pay for that project because,you know, research is expensive.
(25:18):
And so we had to, you know,apply for some funding and at
the beginning it was really,really challenging because a lot
of the people or the agencieswho are skeptical about
jellyfish, they don't think it'sa thing here in Georgia, but
Georgia has an advantage overother states because here in
Georgia, jellyfish is a statefishery so meaning, you know,
(25:40):
it's legal to harvest and it'slegal to commercialize and
process jellyfish. So we startedworking with this and you know,
apply for funding, we're reallyblessed to receive funding from
the United States Department ofAgriculture through its NIFA
program. That's where everythingreally started to exponentially
grow, I would say. You know, wewe had more resources to do
(26:01):
research and understand moreabout jellyfish, collagen, and
how we could create productsthat will have thickening
properties. A lot of thecollagen-based ingredients that
you see in the food industry areused to provide thickness.
That's not always the case. Insome applications, thickness is
not required. So we were likeworking on understanding at what
(26:23):
points this collagen willprovide thickness and what
conditions this collagen willnot provide thickness and so we
are currently looking at ways toproduce collagen peptides as
well. I don't know if you'veheard, you know, some of the
collagen peptide supplements?
Jordan Powers (26:39):
I keep hearing it in headlines and in all the
trending articles.
Kevin Mis Solval (26:42):
Yeah.
Emily Davenport (26:43):
Uh-huh, yup.
Kevin Mis Solval (26:44):
Most of those collagen peptides supplements
are coming from mammaliancollagen, meaning bovine and
porcine sources. Now we'retrying to introduce a new
collagen source, which isjellyfish. The advantages that
we have with jellyfish is thatjellyfish is one of the few
marine species whose biomass isgoing to increase exponentially
(27:05):
in the next few years. And,arguably, it's due to global
warming, unfortunately. Oceansare getting warmer, are getting
more acidic, and that's justkilling a lot of the jellyfish
predators. Across the globe, notonly here in coastal Georgia,
there is, it's been reportedthat more jellyfish blooms have
(27:27):
been spotted, meaning all thebiomass of jellyfish is
increasing. The question is,what are we going to do with
that excess biomass ofjellyfish? Are we gonna do
anything? Are we just gonna youknow, let it rot in our beaches?
And speaking of that, if you goto Savannah, January, February,
(27:48):
you will see a lot of jellyfishwash off, you know, on the
beaches in that area. You willbe amazed seeing how much
jellyfish biomass is there. Sodefinitely there is a good
supply of jellyfish. When westarted working with this
project several years ago, wespoke with several companies
(28:09):
interested in commercializingall these technologies. One of
the questions that we are askedall the time is how much
jellyfish is in the ocean,right? Obviously, that's not my
area of expertise. I'm not amarine biologist, but we were
really curious about, you know,how much jellyfish is in the
ocean? So what I did, we werelooking for other jellyfish
(28:34):
fisheries in North America. Andturns out, we found that there
is a jellyfish fishery inMexico. Gulf of Santa Clara has
the largest jellyfish fishery inthe United States. So we're
lucky enough, you know, to makecontact with them, and they
invited us for their harvest in2022 last year, so I took my PhD
(28:57):
student who is, you know,leading the project, in charge
of the project. So we went thereto Gulf of Santa Clara, in
Mexico. I was fascinated becausethat fisherman town is in the
middle of a desert. It was anincredible, incredible
experience. And we werefascinated about the amount of
(29:18):
jellyfish we saw there. Lastyear, they processed 500,000
tons
Emily Davenport (29:25):
Wow.
Kevin Mis Solval (29:26):
of jellyfish in that one town operation.
Emily Davenport (29:29):
Wow.
Kevin Mis Solval (29:30):
So, and they say they're seeing more
jellyfish, you know, every year.
We suspect that probably samequantities are going to be found
here in Georgia. It's the samespecies, same type of jellyfish
with you know, great potentialfor becoming a really good raw
material for collagen-basedproducts. Now we're looking at,
you know, studying,understanding more about the
(29:50):
technical aspects of theseproducts. You know, we filed for
a patent a couple of years agowith the University of Georgia
Innovation Gateway. So we'reexpecting that and of course, as
a researcher, we're publishingthe data in scientific journals.
We want to share the knowledgeas well with the world because
jellyfish is one of the fewmarine species who more people
(30:12):
are experimenting with acrossthe globe, not only in the
United States, but also inEurope and Asia. They're
recognizing the potentialeconomic opportunities that may
come with these marine species.
That's kind of, you know, wherewe are right now. My PhD
student, Peter Chiarelli, who isleading the project, received a
(30:36):
USDA predoctoral, NIFApredoctoral fellowship, to work
on jellyfish. And thatfellowship is a prestigious one,
one of the most prestigiousawards that a PhD student in
food science can receive. So I'mso glad, you know, so thankful
for that and all the supportthat we have received from
(30:57):
federal government, stategovernment, and also industry
and, of course, University ofGeorgia.
Jordan Powers (31:03):
How exciting, both for the program and for
this PhD student who really getsto spearhead this project and
make it happen. And we knowwe've covered over the years,
several articles on thejellyfish project. So we'll make
sure to link those in the shownotes for our listeners, so that
they can learn a little bitmore.
Emily Davenport (31:18):
Mm-hmm.
Kevin Mis Solval (31:19):
Excellent.
Jordan Powers (31:20):
So one of the techniques or processes that
you've mentioned several timesnow is spray drying. We got a
little bit of an inside scoop,because last time we were in
Griffin, we got to tour FoodPIC,and see kind of the spray drying
technology in action. But forour listeners who might not be
familiar, can you explain alittle bit more about what spray
drying is?
Kevin Mis Solval (31:37):
Spray drying is a technology that was
introduced more than a centuryago, by the dairy industry. They
had a challenge on making shelfstable milk, they were producing
a lot of milk, but they didn'trealize that they didn't have
enough capacity to, you know,refrigerate all that milk. So
they came up with an idea ofusing hot air to dehydrate, you
(31:59):
know, milk. So spray drying isthat technology that uses, most
of the time hot air, and thathot air will get in contact with
spray product, you see thissmall droplets getting in
contact with hot air. And thatinstantly will dehydrate the
product. And so you can collectpowders. So it's a technology to
produce powders, because it'sversatility, its effectiveness,
(32:22):
and cost effectiveness, mostimportantly, it's widely used
not only in the food industry,but also pharmaceutical
industries, and also chemicalindustry. And now by the
material industry as well. Soyou can have you know, food
powders, shelf stable or withlow moisture content. These
powders will last years. Andthat's why it is a technology
(32:46):
that is widely adopted bydifferent industries.
Emily Davenport (32:49):
That's really cool.
Jordan Powers (32:51):
I remember it looked like it was snowing the
time when we got to see itbecause I think it was a milk
product.
Emily Davenport (32:55):
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Powers (32:55):
And I'm like, oh, it just looks like a little
chamber of snow.
Emily Davenport (32:59):
Just making some snow, hot snow.
Jordan Powers (33:04):
When talking about innovation, right, of food
products, you mentioned the UGAFood Process Innovation and
Commercialization Centerearlier, or FoodPIC, as we
commonly call it, because that'sa mouthful, that I can't believe
I got through on one take.
Emily Davenport (33:17):
Yeah, I'm impressed. I was like, wait,
what is that place you weretalking about? Oh, yeah.
Everyone (33:21):
[laughter]
Jordan Powers (33:23):
Can you tell us more about FoodPIC and how you
partner with Georgia foodbusinesses specifically?
Kevin Mis Solval (33:28):
You know, when I was hired five years ago, part
of my job was to work withFoodPIC. At the time I worked
with Dr. Kirk Kealy was theFoodPIC director. So we
conducted different projects.
One of them was the pomegranateproject that I previously
explained. And I also washelping Dr. Kealy's team to work
with some companies and developeither new food processing
(33:53):
operations or, you know,implementing or optimizing food
processing operations for aspecific client food because
clients, domestic clients thatat the time, they needed
optimization of spray dryingoperations. So that's, you know,
some of the work I help with inother areas. I also help with
product development approaches.
(34:17):
So we had a project with acompany that was trying to
develop products from cornprocessing waste streams. So
we're looking at waste streamsand trying to develop spray
dried food ingredients fromthose waste streams. That's kind
of, you know, the work that wehave done with FoodPIC and I
served as the interim directorof FoodPIC in 2021 to 2022. We
(34:41):
worked with other companies andhelp companies to develop
products and also contact shelflife studies among other things.
So FoodPIC is always busy.
Everyone (34:52):
[laughter]
Jordan Powers (34:52):
It is. Well, and especially that work with the
industry byproducts that you'vejust talked about with FoodPIC
and then previously with withsome of the other projects
you've worked on, what anamazing way to promote
sustainability, to reduce foodwaste. You know, again, we
talked about kind of thetrifecta of people that are
benefiting from these researchproducts. But at the end of the
day, I mean, the environment isbenefiting as well, which is
(35:12):
really exciting.
Emily Davenport (35:13):
Yeah, it's really great. Getting creative
with Georgia food commodities,too, which is also great to
stick close to home. Can youtell us more about what Smart
Food Processing is? And how youuse it in your research?
Kevin Mis Solval (35:27):
Right, thank you for asking that question.
Having worked in the industry inanother, in a completely
different industry to the foodindustry, I saw a lot of the
really nice technologies thatother industries are using to
improve processes, you know,really nice gadgets,
state-of-the-art technologies.
And I was fascinated by it. Andyou know, at the time, of
(35:48):
course, obviously, my hands weretied, I couldn't really explore
those technologies, because Ihad one job and that was running
the spray dryers and leadingthat team, and then being in now
in an academic environment,where I have the opportunity to
explore those ideas, explore,you know, how do we improve
current food processingoperations using modern
(36:12):
technologies? And unfortunately,you know, food industry has
lagged into adopting other, youknow, technologies that are
being very effective in otherindustries. And some of those
technologies are, like, youknow, thermal imaging, for
example. That's a specificexample that I can share with
you. Thermal imagingtechnologies are kind of a, you
know, well studied in otherfields, but not really in the
(36:35):
food processing environment.
Part of the work that we aredoing is using thermal cameras
to get thermal images of foodprocessing operations. So we can
see a different physicalphenomena, especially heat
transfer, energy transferphenomena, with these cameras.
(36:55):
It turns out that some of thesedevices, they used to be
extremely expensive 10, 15 yearsago. Nowadays, they are like in
the hundreds. So we, one projectthat we had funded with the
Central for Product Safety, welooked at using thermal cameras
that can be connected with thesmartphones, those cameras can
be easily used and operated byfood operators to look at the
(37:19):
temperatures of fresh produce.
That was a really nice,interesting project. Nobody had
thought about it and we were,like, evaluating the
effectiveness of using thosecameras and making
recommendations about whetherthose cameras could collect, you
know, reliable data that couldbe compared with our regular
thermometers, or thermocouples,regular temperature recorders.
And turns out, they're even moreeffective, because, you know,
(37:42):
you can collect temperature datain real time, and with
non-contact approaches. So yeah,and there are older
technologies, as well as smarttechnologies, that can be used
to improve our food operations.
And that's why I think now, oneof the areas that my group is
(38:03):
focusing on is to how do weadopt all these technologies
that are out there and implementthose technologies for the
benefit of the food industry?
Emily Davenport (38:12):
We've heard you're focusing on developing
simulations to optimize foodprocessing conditions. So for
our audience who doesn't, mightnot have computer science
backgrounds, tell us more aboutwhat's involved. And how often
do you get to play with virtualreality?
Kevin Mis Solval (38:29):
Right, that's a good question. Computer
simulations are cool tools, Iwould say, that I started
working with when I was in gradschool. In fact, on my PhD
thesis was about computersimulations of spray drying
operations. A lot of theprocesses that we currently use
in the food industry, we don'tunderstand them really well, in
(38:51):
terms of the physical phenomenathat is happening. With computer
simulations, you know, thesesimulations do is they help us
to gain a better understandingof the physical phenomena,
meaning, heat, mass transfer,energy transfer, all these
things that physicists andengineers like to, you know,
study. And the main reason forthat is because we wanted to
(39:13):
gain all that knowledge so wecan improve that operation. We
can improve not only theoperation, but also improve the
type of products that are beingprocessed with that operation.
In the case of spray drying, thework that I did was to
understand how this hot air wasactually interacting with all
these products that were beingdried. So by understanding that,
(39:36):
we could design betteroperations, so the product, the
resulting food powders that cameout of the spray dryer, were
higher quality and morenutritious, and of course safe.
So that's one of the ways, youknow, we use computer
simulations. And the, anotheradvantage of using computer
simulations is also that they'remore cost effective than,
(39:59):
compared to conductingexperimental work in the field,
so with computer simulation, we,you know, simulate something
that will happen in reality,right? So we simulate a spray
drying operation, for example.
So we can simulate differentconditions or have different
assumptions. And we'll have thespecific answers. So that
definitely helped me speed upthe, you know, R&D process. And
(40:24):
that's definitely beneficial.
And speaking of virtual reality,so, I started working with
virtual reality a couple ofyears ago, because we had a
problem with showing our FoodPICfacilities, actually. So we get
clients from all over the, youknow, the United States wanted
(40:44):
to see what kind of equipment wehad in FoodPIC. And what, how
our facilities look like. So wecame up with the idea, oh, why
don't we 3D scan the facilities,and we share that scan with our
potential clients? And that'swhere we started working with
virtual reality. And we getreally excited about the quality
(41:05):
of the scans that we couldcollect, and then the type of
tools that the client needed toobserve all those, you know, 3D
scans, these virtual realities.
And it turns out, that it has alot of applications to improve
food safety operations, foodprocessing operations. For
example, if you are in corporateheadquarters, let's say Chicago,
and you have facilities inGeorgia, and you want to see how
(41:28):
your current facilities looklike, you can definitely you
know, access some of these 3Dmodels of your facilities, and
observe how the current statusof your facility look like. We
have done 3D scanned severalcommercial food processing
facilities over the years. Thathas helped a lot the clients to
improve their operations. Sowe're really fascinated by that,
(41:50):
and that's a couple of examplesthat how we have used that
technology to improveoperations.
Emily Davenport (41:57):
Cool, wow.
Jordan Powers (41:58):
It is. It's incredible to think about, you
know, obviously, spray dryingdoesn't look like what it did
centuries ago. But it's amazingto talk about a technology that
has been around for centuries,and then all of this new
technology really just comingtogether. And again, I still, it
just blows my mind that at theend of the day, when you pull
that product off the shelf andgo to check out at the grocery
store, I guarantee you for mostpeople, these are not the
(42:19):
thoughts that probably gothrough their head. Grocery
shopping must be a lot differentfor you.
Everyone (42:23):
[laughter]
Emily Davenport (42:23):
Yeah, right?
Jordan Powers (42:27):
But we have, we've covered so much ground
today, from some of these newtechnologies to the age-old
technologies to a focus onGeorgia commodities that turn
around and impact the world.
What have we missed?
Kevin Mis Solval (42:39):
I just want to say I'm so blessed and grateful
to have my current position.
Like I said before, I don'tremember having so much fun, you
know, in my job. It's definitelya privilege to have the
opportunity to work forUniversity of Georgia as a
faculty member with a great,great, great team. I couldn't
have achieved what I haveachieved without obviously the
support of my family, mymentors, my department, an
(43:02):
incredible department head thatis always supportive. He is
providing some resources for usto explore in other areas of
research. And also the supportfrom our college, College of
Agricultural and EnvironmentalSciences. And the University of
Georgia and of course, theUniversity of Georgia Griffin
Campus. I feel that I'm soblessed. I'm so happy here to
(43:25):
spend more time with mystudents, my staff, it's a
privilege to mentor all theseyoung people as well, I
definitely enjoy working withthem, I'm so happy when they
they publish an article or theythey receive an award. And that
makes me really happy. Thatbrings me joy, definitely more
than you know, publishing anarticle, it, the impact that my
(43:46):
work is having on other people'slives, especially the young
ones. So I'm fully dedicated totraining the next generation of
food scientists, foodinnovators, very positive that a
lot of my current students, theywill join industry, federal, or
state government, you know, inkey positions in the next few
(44:06):
years. So, and that's the legacythat I want to leave behind. And
I appreciate the opportunitythat you're providing me the
platform to share some of myaccomplishments with the general
public. And we're always open,you know, to conversations and
willing to learn more about howwe can help. That's our dilemma
(44:26):
in the lab, how we can help. Howwe can help our industry, how we
can help our community. Alwaysthe question I ask myself and my
team, how we can help.
Jordan Powers (44:38):
I can't think of a more perfect or inspirational
way to end this conversation.
Emily Davenport (44:42):
Yeah.
Jordan Powers (44:42):
So, Kevin, thank you so much for inviting us out
to the Griffin Campus and takingthe time today.
Kevin Mis Solval (44:46):
Thank you so much.
Emily Davenport (44:47):
Thank you. Yay!
Sound Effect (44:51):
[music]
Emily Davenport (44:51):
Yay. Thanks for listening to cultivating
curiosity, a podcast produced bythe UGA College of Agricultural
and Environmental Sciences Aspecial thanks to Mason
McClintock for our music andsound effects. Find more
episodes wherever you get yourpodcasts.
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