Specialisation:

Chemical Engineering, Food Engineering

Major Professional Contributions:

• Developed Asia's first engineered human stomach and small intestine model for digestibility, bioavailability and glycemic index studies.

• Developed India's first indigenous food 3D printer and authored India's first scientific publication on 3D food printing.

• Food 4D printing- India’s first research work and scientific publication on 4-D printing and developed novel range of curcumin-based 4D-printed foods with color transformation capabilities

• Developed CSIR Designer Rice- Technology for the production of high protein, low glycemic index kernels enriched with micronutrients. Low Glycemic Index (< 55), higher than 20% protein content, improved fiber content and enriched with micronutrients, including iron, folic acid, and vitamin B12.

• Developed process for production of Coffee Crema with improved Crema stability.  ‘Crema’ has an outstanding stability for up to six minutes. It improves visual appeal and aroma. 

• Developed the biomedical waste Rig which is an incineration-free solution for managing pathogenic biomedical waste. It effectively disinfects and immobilizes infectious biomedical waste. The treated waste has strong antimicrobial activity and is non-toxic.

• Developed Millet ice cream which is a non-dairy ice cream enriched with omega-3 fatty acids and valuable nutrients. It is an excellent means for value addition of millets (and improved income for millet growers). It is sensory in par with commercial dairy counterparts.

• Waste-to wealth: Developed a range of value-added products from commercial waste streams from food industries. PepsiCo has completed the market study for commercialization of the developed product. 

• Developed micro and nano-encapsulation methods using spray-freeze-drying and electrospray-freeze-drying for nutraceutical ingredients.

• Developed portable sensors to monitor grain temperature and relative humidity of the surrounding environment during the storage period – IoT cloud based data collection for supervision and precautionary action.

• Initiated the Mission Onion Program (automated shallot processing unit) and the Mission Coconut Program (tender coconut water powder, enriched coconut milk, nutri-chips and neera)

• Introduced mobile processing units (MPUs) for farm-gate processing. The unit can be taken to the field to develop value-added products with improved storage stability, particularly during peak harvest seasons.

• Led NIFTEM-Thanjavur (formerly IIFPT) as Director from 2016, and currently leads CSIR-NIIST, Thiruvananthapuram.

• Holds patents in areas including Garcinia extract encapsulation and protein recovery from cheese whey and fish waste.

Consultancy Areas:

• Agro and Food Processing

• Spray Drying and Spray-Freeze-Drying

• Micro and Nano-Encapsulation of Food Bioactives and Nutraceuticals Delivery

• Food Fortification

• Glycemic Index Studies

• Engineered Gastrointestinal Models

• 3D/4D Food Printing

• Computational Modelling of Food Processing

• Agri-Food Value Addition

• Technology Transfer and Commercialisation

• Food Entrepreneurship and Start-up Incubation

Sector Associated With:

Educational / Academic institutions, Industry (Private), Industry (PSUs), R&D Organizations, Government (including funding agencies)

Sectors Interested to Offer Service:

Educational / Academic institutions, Industry (Private), Industry (PSUs), R&D Organizations, Government (including funding agencies)

Professional Experience

• Director, CSIR-National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology (CSIR-NIIST), Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India. 

• Former Director, CSIR- National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR - NEERI), Nagpur, Maharashtra, India.

• Former Director, National Institute of Food Technology, Entrepreneurship and Management (NIFTEM), Thanjavur, Tamilnadu, India. 

• Chief Scientist and Coordinator, Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR), CSIR-Central Food Technological Research Institute (CSIR-CFTRI), Mysuru, Karnataka, India. 

• Over two decades of experience in research and administration.

Keywords

·      

• Food Processing

• Spray-freeze-drying

• Nano/micro-encapsulation

• 3D/4D food printing

• Engineered GI models

• Glycemic index studies

• Computational modelling of food processing

• Food fortification