The Northern Crops Institute on the NDSU campus recently hired Minwei Xu as a food scientist, and Mary Niehaus as a food technologist.
In his new role, Xu will use his experience in cereal and food chemistry, sensory and flavor analysis, emulsion, lipid oxidation, antioxidants, brewing and fermentation to assist the technical team, and further the promotion of northern grown crops. He also will perform and direct laboratory testing, food processing, and the development of new products and processes that support NCI educational programs, technical service programs and market development activities.
“I am a big fan of developing new food products based on their physicochemical attributes. It is of great significance to convert crops from the field into foods on the table,” said Xu.
Xu earned his bachelor’s degree in bioengineering at Tianjin University of Technology, master’s degree in fermentation engineering at Jiangnan University, China, and doctorate in cereal science at NDSU.
Niehaus will assist in wheat, soy and pulse projects to help further NCI’s educational programs, technical service programs and market development activities. She specializes in sensory analysis and storage stability, protein extraction, lipid analysis and baking.
“I enjoy working on the product development projects incorporating the wide variety of crops grown in the northern region and enjoy seeing the outcomes of adding new ingredient treatments to products,” Niehaus said. There is always something new to learn in product development.”
Niehaus spent the past 20 years working at NDSU’s cereal and food science groups conducting service and research projects using northern grown crops with the majority of work in lipids and starch analysis, product development and shelf life studies. She previously was employed at American Crystal Sugar Co. in the technical services department working on various laboratory projects regarding sugar production quality control, and employee laboratory training. Niehaus earned her bachelor’s degree in physical science from Concordia College.
