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About us

In 2010 the State University of Maringá had already several courses for undergraduate  students in the broad area of food sciences (Food Engineering, Food Technology, Agronomy, Animal Science) as well as postgraduate programs in the fields of agrarian, engineering and biological sciences (Agronomy, Animal Science, Chemical Engineering and Biology). A program focusing on the entire food production chain, however, was still lacking. The initiative aiming to fill this gap was based on three main points: 1) the region into which UEM is inserted contributes with a significant fraction of the total food production and processing in Brazil. 2) UEM trains high level professionals (with recognized quality by several national and international indicators) capable of acting in all areas of the production and food processing chains; 3) UEM is located in the Northwest of the State of Paraná where only a single postgraduate program in the area of Food Sciences exits, namely at the State University of Londrina. These were the fundaments that led to the creation of the Graduate Program in Food Sciences (PPC) in 2010. The program was located at the Center for Agricultural Sciences (CCA) of the State University of Maringá (UEM) and had the purpose of training human resources and doing research and development in the area of food science and technology. At the time of its creation the new program was recommended and rated by CAPES as grade 4 for both Master and Doctor degrees in a rating system than ranges between 1 and 7. CAPES is the Brazilian federal agency responsible for evaluating and rating the postgraduate study programs in the whole country. In the quadrennium 2013-2016 the grade was raised to 5. The creation of the Graduate Program in Food Science at UEM can be considered a successful enterprise with respect to both formation of human resources and publication of scientific articles. Due to the multidisciplinarity of the program, as revealed by the list of projects and the characteristics of the teaching and research staff, the program is able not only to focus on the entire food production and processing chain, but also to act in the areas of waste utilization, including the energy sector and the environmental area, seeking alternatives for reducing pollution from food production and processing. The Program also performs very strongly in technological areas such as the development of functional foods, animal models of gene expression for environmental and food stress, live quality improvement through food, especially by the study of natural antioxidants among other lines at the frontier of science.