GNDU researcher feted for presentation at international meet

Shivangi Sharma, a research scholar of the Department of Food Science and Technology of Guru Nanak Dev University, has been awarded “Second Position” for her presentation in the International Conference on “Emerging Technologies in Food Processing-IV (ETFP-2024)”. The conference was organised by the Department of Food Engineering and Technology, Ghani Khan Choudhury Institute of Engineering and Technology, Malda, West Bengal.

She presented her poster entitled “Formulation of Indian convenience foods for dysphagia patients”, co-authored by Dr Navdeep Singh Sodhi of the university, Dr Bhavnita Dhillon and Dr Sukhraj Kaur, in the online mode on the conference theme of “Functional Food and Nutraceuticals”.

Her research work was focused on formulating Indian convenience foods for dysphagia patients under the guidelines of International Dysphagia Diet Standardisation Initiative (IDDSI). Dysphagia, a swallowing difficulty common in the aging population, is often accompanied by symptoms such as coughing, choking during meals and a sensation of food getting stuck in the throat. There is a high global prevalence of dysphagia as more than 590 million people worldwide are suffering with this condition. Her research advocates that the foods formulated in the study can be included in the diets of dysphagia patients under the guidance of a medical practitioner.

Sharma is pursuing PhD on the proposed research topic “Application of electromyography (EMG) for in vivo textural evaluation of Indian convenience foods formulated for dysphagia patients” under the joint supervision of Dr Navdeep Singh Sodhi, professor, Department of Food Science and Technology, and Dr Sukhraj Kaur, Associate Professor, Department of Microbiology of Guru Nanak Dev University.