Visiting Scholars
The Wheat Marketing Center’s (WMC’s) Visiting Scholar program invites wheat-focused science professionals from key international markets to spend up to 12 months to gain technical knowledge about U.S. wheat. Technical exchanges not only strengthen relationships and create networks with current and emerging technical leaders but also build foundations for better recognition of the comparative advantages of using U.S. wheat in existing and new product markets. Scholars have come from many key markets, including Japan, Taiwan, Mexico, China, the Philippines, and South Korea. Since the program’s inception in 2001, WMC has hosted more than 30 visiting scholars from nine countries.
Each scholar conducts at least one independent research project, developed jointly by Dr. Jayne Bock, WMC Technical Director, and the scholar’s institution/company. Research results are made public, usually in the form of a technical journal article. In addition to their specific research projects, scholars provide staff support for many WMC technical short courses, facility tours, and the annual crop quality project. Click here for a short video about the program.
Visiting Scholars are recruited on an ongoing basis. Interested applicants can access the informational page and the online application form by CLICKING HERE.
Shikhadri Mahanta in the Bake Lab working on the cake portion of the project
2022 Scholar:
Ms. Shikhadri Mahanta is a PhD student in the department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering at Texas A&M University. Her research is focused on developing engineering techniques to increase the of wheat flour. Shikhadri started her work at Wheat Marketing Center (WMC) in June 2022 to understand the effects of a novel technology called Atmospheric Cold Plasma on soft wheat and hard wheat flours, plus end-products such as cakes and breads!
2019/20 Scholar:
Ms. Yu-Ching Huang from the China Grains Products Research and Development Institute (CGPRDI) in Taiwan arrived in July 2019 for a one-year residency. CGPRDI was established over fifty years ago in cooperation with USW and is the leading baking training and research center in Taiwan. Ms. Huang focused her research efforts on whole wheat steamed bread, including comparisons across different U.S. wheat classes and bran particle sizes.
2018 Scholar:
Ms. Ponsettia Larracas, New Product Development Specialist-Flour, Manila Philippines, was the 2018 scholar. She worked on Wheat Crop Quality for the Pacific Northwest Wheat Crop. She learned processes involved with evaluating quality and utilization of PNW wheat, educating the wheat industry on new crop quality, and facilitating dialogue among wheat industry leaders and research institutions.
2017 Scholar:
Ms. Min XU, Ph.D. student at the College of Tea and Food Science and Technology, Anhui Agricultural University, was at WMC from June 2017 to June 2018. Her research project focused on the use of green tea extract to improve Asian noodle antioxidant and end product quality.
2016 Scholars:
Dr. Wenyin (Sofia) Zheng, Associate Professor, Anhui Agricultural University, Hefei, China; January – December, 2016. Her projects included evaluating soft white whole wheat flour in baked products and wine grape pomace-fortified bread.
Mr. Yosep Kim, Researcher, Daehan Flour Mill, Incheon, South Korea; February – August, 2016. Mr. Kim studied the relationship between protein and sponge cake quality and identified optimal flour blends for sponge cakes.
Mr. Jungang Wang, Ph.D. student, Washington State University; May – September, 2016. He evaluated optimization of the GlutoPeak method for whole wheat flour and supported the crop quality surveys.
Dr. Sofia Zheng, 2016 Visiting Scholar
Yosep Joe Kim, 2016 Visiting Scholar
Jungang Wang, 2016 Visiting Scholar