Milestone for the food industry: UCM will develop natural antioxidant

An academic from the Universidad Católica del Maule was awarded FIA resources to prevent food oxidation.

The first laboratory antioxidant based on natural ingredients could become a reality, thanks to research carried out by Ángela Contreras, an academic at the Universidad Católica del Maule (UCM).

“The idea is to produce these antioxidants using cultures where microorganisms participate, which help process agricultural waste material. The product is expected to function as an antioxidant in processed foods,” explained the doctor in Food Sciences, who won the last version of the FIA’s National Call for Innovation Projects in Food Systems.

“We want to give an option to the processed food industry that in general needs some type of antioxidant, which until now have been synthetic. The entry of natural antioxidants has been quite slow at a global level, because it is expensive to produce them and they must be suitable for human consumption”, added the also professor of the School of Biotechnology of the UCM.

Contribution to food security

The Foundation for Agrarian Innovation (FIA), which belongs to the Ministry of Agriculture, carries out competitive calls to contribute, among other purposes, to sustainable development and competitiveness in the forestry and livestock sector and to the national agri-food chain. Dr. Contreras’ project, entitled “Production of natural antioxidants through the renewable use of microorganisms”, is in line not only with the purposes of the competition, but also with the priority areas of research of the institution, among which are the environment and natural resources.

“The initiative is a contribution to people’s food security, with a focus on environmental foundations for future generations. We are proud to have successfully advised the application, because it has been a long time since UCM obtained FIA funds,” said Rodrigo Herrera, project manager of the Directorate of Innovation, Development and Technology Transfer of the institution of higher education.

The initiative has the collaboration of doctors Cristian Valdés, Juan Luis López and Andrés Valenzuela, from the CIEAM, the Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Social and Economic Sciences of the UCM, respectively.

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