News
Summer School 2024 at Penn State University, USA
In summer 2024, five students from TU Graz—Christina Mühlthaler, Lisa Eiber, Niklas Pontesegger, Lara Stef, and Markus Windisch—participated in a two-week summer school at Penn State University, USA.
The program began in Washington, D.C., where they joined students from Penn State, Fresno University, and the University of Arkansas. The agenda included sightseeing highlights such as the Capitol, museum visits, and a social "come together" event. A visit to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) provided additional insights into the U.S. regulatory landscape.
The group also had the opportunity to visit Restek, a company renowned for its expertise in analytical chemistry, where they gained valuable insights into the application of scientific analysis in the industry.
Next, the group traveled to the Hershey Company, exploring the Technical Center and enjoying time at Hersheypark. The focus then shifted to Penn State University, where the theme revolved around chocolate—“from the bean to the bar.” The students crafted their own chocolate and ice cream while performing various sensory analyses, such as tasting and aroma evaluations.
The Austrian participants also got a taste of American student life, including celebrating the Fourth of July (Independence Day).
This summer school provided not only a cultural exchange but also academic enrichment, particularly in understanding differences between chemical analysis techniques in the USA and Europe. The program was a memorable experience that combined education, culture, and new perspectives.
In 2025, the summer school will be held in Austria from July 6 to July 18, 2025. More information and details for registration will follow.
Food Chemistry @ Lange Nacht der Forschung
The Food Chemistry group had a booth at the “Lange Nacht der Forschung 2024”. Visitors could experience sensory perception – how we perceive odour and taste, how our sensory perception is impacted by colour or by taste enhancers. We were completely overwhelmed by the enormous response! Samples were prepared for approx. 450 visitors and we were out of stock after five hours. Thank you to the whole crew who did an amazing job, thank you to the organizers and thank you to all the visitors who were interested in our research!
The iMoox Course „Metabolic syndrome – When the metabolism runs wild” is online
This MOOC aims to address the underlying causes and consequences of the metabolic syndrome (MetS), a condition that affects over a billion people worldwide (WHO). The MetS is a compilation of risk factors that includes visceral obesity, high blood sugar and triglycerides, low HDL-cholesterol and hypertension. This results in a considerably higher incidence of diseases such as Type 2 Diabetes, liver disease and cardiovascular events. Therefore, there is an urgent need to address this substantial biomedical challenge. This course will deal with diverse aspects related to the MetS resulting from the interdisciplinary background of the involved team members. Therefore, this MOOC course will be integrated into a wide spectrum of university courses: Food and Nutrition Sciences, Biochemistry and Biomedicine, Biomechanics and Tissue Engineering.
You can find the iMoox course here...
Kinderuni visits the ACFC!
On July 12, 15 children aged 7 to 11 visited us and worked hard in a workshop on food waste and sensory evaluation of food!
Wasting food is one of the major future issues – judging food by their visual appearance, odour and taste even after their “best-before-date” helps to minimize the amounts. The kids worked hard and had a lot of fun! It was great to have you here!
New professorship endowed by Mondi
We are glad to pronounce, that our institute, in particular Prof. Erich Leitner, got one of two professorships endowed by the Graz University of Technology and Moni Group. The professorship targets the research of Food Contact Materials as well as the trainig of young talents in business and science.
Theresa Mautz awarded Outstanding Master's Thesis Award
On June 20th, 2024 the Faculty of Technical Chemistry, Chemical and Process Engineering, and Biotechnology honoured exceptional Master's theses and research excellence. Theresa Mautz, under the supervision of Sergey Borisov, received a prestigious cash award of €1.000 for her master's thesis "Surface-Anchored Metal-Organic Frameworks for Optical Sensing of Molecular Oxygen". This recognition highlights her remarkable dedication, scientific independence, creativity, and outstanding contributions to research.
Theresa's work stands as an inspiration for younger students and fosters the spirit of innovation and excellence for future research. Congratulation, Theresa, on this well-deserved achievement!
Two Prizes at the Austrian Food Chemistry Days
The Austrian Food Chemistry Days took place in Vienna from April 3rd to April 5th. The "Food Chemistry" working group was well represented with various posters and presentations. This conference ended very successfully for two of our researchers: Andrea Hochegger was awarded the P.B. Czedik-Eysenberg Award with her paper on the Combination of multidimensional instrumental analysis and the Ames test for the toxicological evaluation of mineral oil aromatic hydrocarbons. Sabrina Stranig won the prize for the best oral presentation about the odour active volatiles in “lupin-coffee” and their formation and analysis. Congratulations to Andrea and Sabrina!
Andrea Hochegger honored with Monatshefte für Chemie - Wissenschaftspreis 2023 for outstanding contribution to chemistry
Every year, the Austrian Chemical Society (GÖCH) and the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW) award a prize for young scientists in chemistry or technical chemistry for a scientific publication that has already been published or accepted for printing for GÖCH members whose doctorate was awarded no earlier than the summer semester of 2015.
This year Andrea Hochegger's exceptional work has earned her this distinguished accolade, highlighting her contributions to the field of chemistry.
Sabrina Stranig awarded with the WKO Forschungsstipendium for her master thesis on the flavour formation in ‘lupin-coffee’
Sabrina Stranig’s master thesis on the flavour formation during the roasting process of lupin seed was awarded with the “WKO Forschungsstipendium 2023”. This work was conducted in close cooperation with Johann Krois/Steirerkaffee who cultivated the lupins seeds close to Graz. Using Johann’s professional coffee roaster, Sabrina had the opportunity to perform those roasting experiments that were required for this work. The results of this work give insight into the complex chemistry of the flavour of the sustainable coffee-alternative. Congrats, Sabrina!
A short video on Sabrina’s work together with those of other awarded TU colleagues can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbFSt7rEZ-A
Andrea Hochegger wins Special Award "Tech for Green" 2022 for innovative dissertation
Andrea Hochegger was received the Special Award "Tech for Green" 2022, presented as part of the Women's Award for Digitalization and innovation by ORF and Infineon Technologies Austria. The award recognizes her dissertation, titled "Packaging Related Food Safety Aspects - Analytical Contributions to the Characterization of Food and Food Contact Materials", for its innovative approach to addressing food safety and challenges in food packaging.
Niklas Pontesegger awarded with the GIRACT First Year PhD Bursary
Niklas Pontesegger was awarded with the First Year PhD Bursary within the GIRACT European PhD in Flavour Research Programme!
The Giract programme aims to promote flavour research amongst PhD students in Europe, which is supported by seven industry sponsors. Niklas was one of the six selected students from different research institutions from all over Europe. Congratulations Niklas!
Find more information here
Summer School 2023 "Food Science and Culinary Arts - from Field to Meal"
June 25th- July 7th 2023
The Summer School "Food Science and Culinary Arts - from Field to Meal" took place between July 25th and July 7th. The host of the summer program was the Graz University of Technology. During the thirteen days, the 13 participants from different countries learned a lot about food production in Styria. Read more[...]
Summer School 2022 "Food Science and Culinary Arts - from Field to Meal"
July 16th-26th 2022
After a two-year break due to Covid, the Summer School "Food Science and Culinary Arts - from Field to Meal" took place between July 16th and 26th. The host of the summer program was the California State University, Fresno. During the eleven days, the 13 participants from different countries learned a lot about food production in California. Read more[...]
Summer School 2019 "Food Science and Culinary Arts - from Field to Meal"
July 9th-21st 2019
The summer school on “Food Science and Culinary Arts – from Field to Meal” was held at our institute for the second time in cooperation with the University of Arkansas. Together with 10 participants from different countries, four students from our institute learned about food production including food safety and food processing. Read more[...]
EUROoCO 2019 - 2nd European Organ-on-Chip Conference, 2-3 July 2019, Graz, Austria
The EUROoC conference aims to gather the research leaders in the emerging field organs-on-chip (OoC) with a special focus on young and upcoming scientists. The extremely interdisciplinary field of OoC research is rapidly growing while new and innovative systems are constantly being developed. However, a variety of engineering challenges are remaining, which the OoC field has to address as a whole to enable a sustainable growth of this breakthrough technology. Read more [...]
Weurman Flavour Research Symposium
In memory of Cornelius Weurman, a pioneer of flavour research, the Weurman Flavour Research Symposium has become one of the most important international conferences on all relevant topics from the field of flavour science. Since 1975, the Weurman Flavour Research Symposium has been a unique platform for flavour scientists from all over the world offering the opportunity to discuss recent trends and developments in the field of flavour research. Read more [...]