Process Consultant for the Food and Beverage Industries

Responsible for process development and commercialization of new products and processes.• Investigated different research platforms for juice and Sweetened Dried Cranberries (SDC) to create new products, improve product quality, process performance and cost.• Led the process development and commercialization of Ocean Spray Craisins Fruit Clusters.• Responsible for developing a new platform for carbonated juice processing in the research labs and pilot plant involving carbonation, seaming, and pasteurization of cans.• Led the process development and commercialization of Sparkling Cranberry Juice products, pioneering Ocean Spray’s entry into the carbonated juice arena.

Responsible for Global Gum commercialization of Chewing Gums.• Led process teams to commercialize new gum startup at factories in the US, Mexico, and Poland. Products included Trident, Dentyne, Stride, and Hollywood brands.• Coordinated special projects to better understand the fundamental properties of gums and gum bases as they are processed.

Responsible for developing processes for new products and improving efficiency of existing plants.• Member of the Bush Brothers Research Council: Continuously sought out new technologies, and their potential applications to Bush Brother and Company. • Coordinated research efforts with leading universities to evaluate how key new technologies could be used to improve bean characteristics.• Optimized bean processing operations, such as soaking, blanching, cooking, and cooling steps to reduce process time, increase throughput, and reduce bean damage.

Responsible for developing new and improving current Progresso soups.• Led Progresso Soup Division R&D (formerly part of Pillsbury) in the development of new processes for new soups yet to be launched but projected to gain market share over the competition.• Optimized individual unit operations in the soup process resulting in efficiency and cost savings.Led R&D teams with other cross functional groups from marketing, sales, finance, andconsumer insights into scheduling, consumer testing, sales samples production, and final product startup, resulting in competitive products and effective cost savings.• Spearheaded R&D engineering efforts that developed innovative new processes for Sweet Rewards fat free bars.• Awarded two U.S. Patents for the development of a novel slitting technology for fat free bars.• Developed a unique process for Homestyle Popsecret microwave popcorn to provide its special flavor profile.• Contributed to resolving a long term processing challenge making the French Toast Crunch cereal “clump” free.• Led the R&D Team that developed two new innovative Lucky Charms cereals, namely Sparkling Rainbow and Crystal Ball Lucky Charms, enabling the third largest selling brand to maintain its superiority over the competition.• Awarded a U.S. Patent for developing unique and innovative cereal products.Led R&D process development for several new products, including Betty Crocker Recipe Sauces, and Betty Crocker Dinner Sensations, a speed scratch shelf-stable meal, enabling the company to have an expanded line in the meals category. • Developed the first caramel popcorn bar variety in the market place.• Awarded two U.S. patents (design and process) for the Betty Crocker Popcorn Bar.• Investigated several new technologies to improve and optimize Side Dishes, including speeding up of cooking time by 25 percent.

Coordinated and supervised research programs on Low Acid Aseptic Processing with Particulates with the Food Science and Microelectronics Laboratories.• Investigated the need for lethality measurements in particle “cold spots” during low acid aseptic processing involving particulates.• Led cross functional team that characterized diffusional kinetics of metal ions in Metal-Oxide-Semiconductors (MOS) by Capacitance-Voltage (C-V) and microamperometric techniques.• Developed a Thermal Memory Cell (TMC) for measurement of lethality of particle centers in two-phase aseptic flow processes.• Awarded two U.S. patents and one Taiwan patent for the Thermal Memory Cell design and development.

• Developed novel Interfacial techniques of metal recovery from industrial waste water streams that reduced costs of downstream processing.

• Implemented several major modifications in the $3 million pilot plant, resulting in the successful startup and trouble free operations.• Designed a Toxic Trace Element Sampling System that sampled various solid, liquid, and gaseous effluent streams from the pilot plant.

• Designed, developed, and operated a bench-scale fluidized bed reactor that gasified coal and biomass feed stock.• Developed gas chromatography methods that analyzed product gases from the fluidized bed gasifier.• Operated a pilot plant fluidized bed reactor and analyzed effluent gas concentrations