At Elea, we are not only working on customer-related projects; we are also doing our own research to better understand how PEF can influence different processing steps and to find new applications for our technology. That is why we maintain a strong relationship to numerous universities and offer Bachelor and Master students the opportunity to do their research project and their final thesis with us.

One of the first students with us was Felix, who finished his bachelor degree in August 2015. In his project, Felix successfully worked on enhancing mass transport of potatoes by means of centrifuge and PEF. With his work he demonstrated that PEF pre-treatment followed by a centrifugation step can increase the fluid leakage. The reduction in moisture has a great impact on chips production due to a shorter frying time and lower fat levels.

At the moment, three more students are working on their projects within Elea R&D:

• Philip is studying Food Economy at the University of Applied Science Trier. His master thesis project is to improve the drying process of onions by a Pulsed Electric Fields treatment. The aim of this study is to determine the potential of a PEF treatment in the matter of time, energy and cost saving aspects for this production process.

• Annkathrin is studying Food Production Engineering and Business at the University of Applied Science Osnabrueck. Her bachelor thesis in cooperation with Sensient Colors is about the evaluation of different technologies for food colour extraction.

• Vanessa, also from Osnabrück, is studying Bioengineering in Agriculture and Food Industry. Within her bachelor thesis she will evaluate the influence of different process parameters on the behaviour of bacteria cultures.