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HEStaff exchange2023–2027

RIA4FOOD · Multi-Actor Research and Innovation Approaches for Functional Food

Horizon Europe — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Duration
2023-11-01 → 2027-10-31
EU contribution
€1,600,800
Participants
11
Scheme
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-SE

Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.

Results in brief

Multi-Actor Research and Innovation Approaches for Functional Food

The RIA4FOOD project aims to meet growing global demand for nutritious, sustainable food by developing sea buckthorn (SB)-based functional foods with proven health benefits. It combines advanced profiling of SB varieties with optimized processing techniques, like osmotic dehydration, to produce long-lasting, health-promoting products. Utilizing human-relevant in vitro dietary and disease models and a complete metabolomic, epiproteomic and proteomic analysis, the project will assess the physiological pathways affected from sea buckthorn consumption. These profiles will be then put under rigorous machine learning analysis, to produce algorithms that will calculate the correct amount of bioactive ingredients needed to confer the desired health benefits and will thus facilitate the design of new functional products, aligning with the EU’s Horizon Europe goals for food security and public health through innovative, health-focused foods.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

Keeping up with the dramatic increase in world-food needs is a challenging task. Food supply is further affected by the latest consumers’ dietary trends, driving demand for food products of enhanced nutritional value, defined health benefits, increased safety and proven environmental sustainability. RIA4FOOD will tackle these challenges by proposing a new framework for functional food design. RIA4FOOD will utilise sea buckthorn berries as source of bioactive compounds, in conjunction with state-of-the-art methodologies from different disciplines, to showcase a scientifically-sound way of making food products functional and of proven added health value which can sustain nutritional needs of all consumer groups (healthy, diseased, obese, children, athletes, etc.). Utilising human-relevant in vitro dietary and disease models and a complete metabolomic, epiproteomic and proteomic analysis, the project will assess the physiological pathways affected from sea buckthorn consumption. These profiles will be then put under rigorous machine learning analysis, to produce algorithms that will calculate the correct amount of bioactive ingredients needed to confer the desired health benefits and will thus facilitate the design of new functional products. More importantly, RIA4FOOD will also explore new technologies to deliver fresh sea buckthorn health benefits to the market as snacks of increased shelf-life. For this the osmotic dehydration methodology will be put to the test: metabolomic, epiproteomic and proteomic profiles of osmotic sea buckthorn consumption will also be produced and compared to the respective profiles of the fresh fruit. Finally, additional predictive algorithms will be computed, to provide effective feedbacks to both the primary farming sector and the processing sector, thus fostering the optimisation of the new proposed food value chain.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

  • REZOS BRANDS ANONYMI EMPORIKI ETERIA IDON DIATROFIS · PATRASCoordinatorGreece
  • CENTER FOR TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH ANDINNOVATION (CETRI) LTD · NICOSIACyprus
  • EREVNITIKO KENTRO VIOIATRIKON EPISTIMON ALEXANDROS FLEMINGK · Vari-AthensGreece
  • INSPIRE SCIENCE SRL · JUDET CLUJRomania
  • KYPRIAKO IDRYMA EREVNON GIA TI MYIKI DISTROFIA · AGIOS DOMETIOSCyprus
  • NOVAMECHANICS LIMITED · NicosiaCyprus
  • PANEPISTIMIO PATRON · RIO PATRASGreece
  • UDRUZENJE ZA PREDUZETNISTVO I INOVACIJE FUTURE SYSTEMS HUB · Novi SadSerbia
  • UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DEL PIEMONTE ORIENTALE AMEDEO AVOGADRO · VercelliItaly
  • UNIVERSITATEA DE STIINTE AGRICOLE SI MEDICINA VETERINARA CLUJ NAPOCA · Cluj NapocaRomania
  • Y.S. CYPRIOT CATALYSTS LIMITED · AMMOCHOSTOSCyprus

Links

Data: CORDIS, © European Union