Lía Vanessa Guardiola

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Dr. Lía Guardiola-Ponce was born in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in Food Science and Technology (2007) from Zamorano University in Honduras. She came to Illinois in 2008 as a visiting scholar to the Illinois Natural History Survey at the University of Illinois were she worked in both a greenhouse and a Medical entomology lab. In the Fall of 2009, she started her graduate studies in the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition. She earned her Master’s degree in Food Science and Human Nutrition in 2011. Her research work contributed to the US Patent No. 9,504,274. (2016), “Methods of flavor encapsulation and matrix-assisted concentration of aqueous foods and products produced therefrom.”

After graduation she worked for PepsiCo Research & Development Center in Barrington, IL. She returned to UIUC and obtained her PhD, also in Food Science and Human Nutrition in 2019. Her research focused on the characterization of zein extracted from beer solids, a coproduct of dry-grind ethanol. During her time in grad school Lía worked as teaching assistant for two core classes in FSHN; Raw Material for processing and Food Chemistry lab.

In March of 2019, Lía joined the Stein Lab as a Postdoctoral Research Associate.