Paul Nesvadba
Title Modelling mechanical response of biomaterials
Abstract Mechanical properties of biomaterials are important in many areas of agriculture, food engineering and also medicine, such as the design and control of processes, diagnostics and quality assurance. This contribution reviews some of the scenarios that require measurement and modelling of the mechanical response of solid and liquid biomaterials and discusses appropriate physical and mathematical models and their limitations.
Authors  
Speaker Paul Nesvadba
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Institution Food Science & Technology Research Centre, The Robert Gordon University
web page
 http://www.rgu.ac.uk/subj/fsatrc/

 

The centre was established in the wake of the closure of the MAFF - CSL - Food Science Laboratory, Torry, Aberdeen, in 1996.

The objective of the Centre is to improve the quality and safety of foods, by carrying out R&D work on a number of projects:

On-line Database of Physical Properties of Foods
A free access database of bibliographic references and experimental data on the physical properties of foods over a wide range of conditions and processes.

Modelling of Thermal Properties and Behaviour of Foods
Optimisation of Harvesting Procedures of Farmed Fish with Respect to Quality and Welfare
New Technology for Rapid Freezing of Foods
Physical Methods for Monitoring the Quality of Fish
Osmotic Treatments for Improved Quality and Safety of Foods
Improvement of the Quality and Safety of Frozen Foods Throughout the Distribution Chain
DTI NMS, Programme 3.4 (Department of Trade and Industry, National Measurement System)
To develop standards for thermal conductivity of powders, sludges and materials with high moisture content including foods. The RGU is a subcontractor to the National Physical Laboratory, Teddington, Middlesex.

Development of a Network in support of an open access, on-line Fish Technology Knowledge Base.
The overall objective of the Food Physics Group is to improve the quality and safety of foods through application of physical methods and processess. The main activities are:

Measurement and modelling of Thermal Properties and Heat Transfer in food processing
Measurement of Mechanical Properties of Foods
Mathematical modelling of Thermal and Mechanical processes in foods
Developing new freezing technology and osmotic treatments of food
The group is led by Dr. Paul Nesvadba and includes 3 Research Assistants and 2 PhD students.