International Conference on “Ethnic Fermented Foods and Beverages: Microbiology and Health Benefits”
Theme: Ethnic food fermentations represent an extremely valuable cultural heritage in most regions, and house a huge genetic potential of valuable but hitherto undiscovered strains. More than 5000 varieties of common and uncommon fermented foods and alcoholic beverages are consumed in the world. About 80 % of global fermented foods are naturally fermented by both cultivable and uncultivable microorganisms.The application of molecular and modern identification tools through culture-dependent and culture-independent techniques including next generation sequence techniques has thrown new light on the diversity of a number of hitherto unknown and uncultivable microorganisms in naturally fermented foods. The diversity of functional microorganisms in fermented foods and beverages consists of bacteria, yeasts and fungi.Ethnic fermented foods of the world are considered to be a means to preserve microbial diversity ex situ and they are custodians of microbial diversity and play a key role in the storage and supply of authentic reference material for research and development. The most remarkable aspect of fermented foods has biological functions enhancing several health benefits to the consumers due to functional microorganisms associated with them. Health-promoting benefits of fermented foods and beverages are prevention of cardiovascular disease, prevention of cancer, hepatic disease, gastrointestinal disorders and inflammatory bowel disease, protection from hypertension, thrombosis, osteoporosis, allergic reactions, diabetes, protection from spoilage and toxic pathogens, synthesis of nutrient and bioavailability, reduction of obesity, increase immunity, alleviation of lactose intolerance, anti-aging effects and therapeutic values/medicinal values. Today, some ethnic fermented foods and alcoholic beverages are commercialized and marketed globally as health foods or functional foods. Increased understanding of the viability of probiotic bacteria, interactions between gut microbiota, diet and the host will open up new possibilities of producing new ingredients for nutritionally optimized foods, which promote consumer health through microbial activities in the gut. However 90 % of health-benefitted naturally fermented foods and alcoholic beverages in the world are still at home production under traditional conditions. The proposed International Conference may update and collate information and researches carried out on various aspects of Microbiology and health-promoting benefits of ethnic fermented foods and beverages of the world. During 2 days of the conference, students, researchers, entrepreneurs and teachers will get exposure to a variety of talks to be delivered by well-known experts in the field of fermented foods of the world.
Dates: From Friday 20 November 2015 - 08:00am
To Saturday 21 November 2015 - 05:00pm
Organised by:
Department of Microbiology, School of Life Sciences, Sikkim University (central university), Gangtok, India
In Association with
Swedish South Asian Network on Fermented Foods (SASNET-FF)
Location : Sikkim University
Contact:
Professor Dr. Jyoti Prakash Tamang
Chairperson, Organising Committee
Dean, School of Sciences and Professor, Department of Microbiology
Sikkim University (central university)
6th Mile, Tadong 737102, Gangtok, Sikkim
E-mail:jptamang@cus.ac.in, jyoti_tamang@hotmail.com;
FOR DETAILED INFORMATION, CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD DOCUMENT