Fatma Boukid

About her:

Fatma Boukid is a postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Parma (Italy). She holds an engineering degree in food sciences from the University of Carthage (Tunisia), MSc in Food Science and Technology from the University of Carthage (Tunisia) and a PhD in biology engineering from the University of Sfax (Tunisia). Her doctoral thesis focused on the impact of a century of breeding in Tunisia on the technological quality and the allergenic potential of durum wheat. From 2016 to 2019, she worked with food chemistry division (University of Parma) to identify wheat proteins epitopes associated with disorders such as celiac disease and baker’s asthma using mass spectrometry techniques. Since 2019, she is working with food technology division (University of Parma) on several projects targeting healthier food mainly an Italian-Dutch project for developing gluten-free and gluten-containing functional foods based on cereals and legumes and characterizing their physicochemical and nutritional properties. She is also involved in developing reduced-sugar baked goods using semi solid-fibers.

About her talk:

“Does pulse’s cell wall integrity affect physicochemical properties and in vitro starch hydrolysis of a gluten-free bread?”

Pulses are gaining interest as a functional ingredient in gluten-free bread to decrease the use of starchy ingredients and to improve products’ nutritional profile. Considering that starch granules of pulses are encapsulated in cell walls, modulating the integrity of these walls through different pre-processing can be a major target for increasing the nutritional value of gluten-free bread.