Invited Speakers

Title to be confirmed
Wilson Poon, University of Edinburgh

Professor Peter Barham, Emeritus Professor, University of Bristol

Peter Barham is an Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Bristol, his main career was as a Polymer Physicist, but he managed to turn his passions for food and cooking and for penguins into additional research areas. Author of the Science of Cooking, he introduced Heston Blumenthal to the science behind restaurant food and helped him bring scientific techniques into the kitchen at the Fat Duck. He was for several years the visiting Professor of Molecular Gastronomy at the University of Copenhagen. Although he ‘retired’ 10 years ago he retains interests in the science behind our perception of flavour and still has regular contacts with professional chefs. His main research work today however centres on the conservation of the African penguins in South Africa where he holds the post of Extraordinary Professor in Biodiversity and Conservation Biology at the University of the Western Cape.

Professor Grant Campbell PhD CEng CSci CMgr FIChemE FIFST FCMI SFHEA, Professor of Chemical Engineering, University of Huddersfield

Professor Grant Campbell leads the chemical engineering activities at the University of Huddersfield, and undertakes research on food process engineering and biorefineries. Originally from New Zealand, he came to the UK in 1987 to undertake his PhD at the University of Cambridge. He taught chemical engineering at the University of Manchester for 19 years before joining the University of Huddersfield in 2014 to lead the new chemical engineering programmes. Professor Campbell was awarded the Institution of Chemical Engineers’ 2007 Morton Medal for Excellence in Chemical Engineering Education, the 2016 Hutchison Medal for the most stimulating paper published in an IChemE journal, and the 2020 Davidson Medal for Outstanding Mentoring of Young Chemical Engineers.

Professor Megan James Povey, PhD, FInstP CEng, University of Leeds

Professor Megan Povey has been Professor of Food Physics at Leeds University’s School of Food Science and Nutrition since 2002. She also holds the position of Honorary Visiting Professor at Jiangsu University in Zhenjiang, China, a role she has held since 2017. Since 2015, she has served as Joint Director of the UK-China Food Detection Forum, strengthening international collaboration in food science and technology.

Megan has over 40 years of impactful experience working with food manufacturers such as Unilever, McCain, Nestle, Arla Amba and Olam International. The dry fractionation process for refining of vegetable oil was invented in her laboratory.

Currently collaborating with Professor Nik Watson, Professor of Artificial Intelligence in Food at Leeds.

Dr Krassimir Velikov, Senior Science and Program Leader at the Unilever Innovation Center Wageningen

Dr Krassimir P. Velikov is a Senior Science and Program Leader at the Unilever Innovation Center Wageningen and an adjunct Professor, Chair in Soft Condensed Matter Physics, at the Institute of Physics, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands. In his more than 20 years of experience at Unilever, he focused on development of interfacial and bulk structuring technologies for product functionality control, naturalness, and sustainability. His research interests cover topics of soft-condensed matter, colloid and interface science of dispersions and their uses to control product functionality (e.g. stability, appearance, texture, mouthfeel and taste), physical chemistry of digestion, and formulation and delivery of functional ingredients. He is a co-author of over 130 research articles, 10 book chapters, and 55 patents (29 with grants); cited > 8 000 times in the literature (h-index = 43).