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A diploma work with a twist
A fourth-year student of Ural State University of Economics presented a healthy dessert as her graduation work. 100 grams of her pastila contains almost 100% of the daily intake of vitamins C and B3, a unique additive—essential oil obtained in a fundamentally new way.
A student of the USUE Department of Food Biotechnology, Darya Shestakova has worked on obtaining the additive for 2 years. The girl developed her own technology for obtaining essential oil from citrus fruits, which do not hit store shelves and are not suitable for processing. Besides, it takes less than a day to obtain the product.
“The innovative nature of the technology is in the use of ultrasound. This method provides the same volume of product in just 12 hours, while traditional methods require 3-4 days to achieve a similar result,” Darya explains.
The essential oil obtained with Darya Shestakova's technology can be used in cosmetics and food products. The girl opted for a food additive. She developed both the technology for obtaining essential oil and a recipe for confectionery products. The pastila, which Darya presented to the commission as her graduation work, is similar in taste and consistency to “Bird's Milk,” while being very healthy, enriched with citrus phytonutrients and a vitamin-mineral complex. The girl explained that orange peels, from which she obtains oil, are a valuable product, containing vitamins A, E, C, B, potassium, calcium, iron, and zinc, which are essential for humans. For example, a ten-gram candy contains 9.4 mg of vitamin C (with a daily intake of 100 mg) and 11 mg of vitamin B3 (with a recommended daily intake of 12-16 mg).
Her thesis supervisor, the head of the USUE Department of Biotechnology and Engineering, Vladimir Lazarev, noted that Darya demonstrates impressive results in research and is also a scholarship holder of the Governor of the Sverdlovsk region:
“This is one of the first cases at our department when scientific developments have received practical significance. The originality of the work was 93%. The only thing left is to launch production.”
The members of the commission highly appreciated the development. The CEO of a Yekaterinburg company for the production of bioproducts, Anton Tarasenko, graded the work “excellent”. He said, “The market for marshmallow and pastila is huge. There is a need for these products. When a new assortment is added, it will most likely be in demand. The only question is the site that will be able to sell the product. Darya's project is interesting and relevant.”
Darya Shestakova's graduation work is a startup. The student has already registered a legal entity. Now she is simultaneously filing a patent for the technology of obtaining essential oil from citrus fruits and looking for an enterprise that will engage in high-volume production of confectionery products according to her recipes. And then Darya plans to go deep into scientific research and developments in natural and technical sciences.
