NMSU professor finding ways to improve ice cream

LAS CRUCES, N.M. (KVIA) -- A professor at New Mexico State University wants to find a way to make ice cream stick around a little longer. Thanks to funding by Blue Bunny Ice Cream, Sergio Martinez-Monteagudo's idea turned into a reality.

He developed the project with the help of six graduate students. ABC-7 spoke with three of them before they graduated this summer.

Muhemmad Azeem Urnrehmen Alvi, Nana Nkansah, and Olatunde Ojo all had their own projects to do as part of the team.

The concept sprouted when Martinez-Monteagudo realizing that there was a hole in the ice cream industry.

"We started talking about different innovation and what is new in terms of making ice cream that can provide a cutting edge," Martinez-Monteagudo said. "I came up with some ideas, and one was to modify the proteins in a unique way so that you can bind water stronger so when it melts, it takes longer to separate."

There was a secondary reason Martinez-Monteagudo began this research journey with his students: his concern for the issues of food waste and sustainability.

"One of the biggest problems in the world is food waste. So we reduce that and it has significant implications on sustainability, economic and overall well-being," Martinez-Monteagudo said.

"When I think of it, we're talking about next generation, not just myself when I leave," Martinez-Monteagudo added. "It's thinking about the next generation and following that has to have the resources to survive and basically have a quality of life."

Martinez-Monteagudo worked with his team of graduate students to create the modified proteins this new ice cream required, which the lab equipment was eventually able to do even though it was on a small scale.

The equipment cracked the code by allowing the team to insert what in this case was ice cream mix and start a process that changes the proteins to allow them to have a stronger bond to water once they are re-frozen, the key to making the ice cream last longer.

One of the graduate students on the team, PhD candidate in Chemical Engineering Muhemmad Azeem Urnrehmen Alvi, told ABC-7 that once he found out about the project, he thought it was too "sweet' to pass up.

"I was really excited when I started working on this project because I love the ice cream," Alvi said. "I was working with the polymers and you can't eat your research but in this case I can."

The team was able to find a template for their product by sampling 36 kinds of ice cream and mapping out each ones melting curve.

By the end, they were able to produce a batch of ice cream that lasted three hours.

When research and hours in a lab can result in something like a potential change in the formula for a major manufacturer like Blue Bunny, Alvi told ABC-7 it makes him happy.

"That's a different kind of happiness," Alvi said. "From the ideation or conceptual basis, you think and then you research how to create that and then to have the product in your hands is the utmost happiness."

There is another aspect to address the line waste concerns Martinez-Monteagudo outlined.

The alternative process involves extracting milk fat for the express use of re-using it in another batch of ice cream. Graduate student Nana Nkansah took charge of that job.

"This topic is not something that's out there," Nkansah said. "You could search online, but not really find data on how to extract fat from ice cream. So when we began, it was a little bit challenging because it's kind of noville because nobody's doing it."

Nkansah showed ABC-7 some of the final product, which only filled half a mason jar. He said the purity was essential for the ability to re-use this fat.

But before any fat extraction was possible, the team needed to add proteins for stabilization, which was Olatunde Ojo's job.

Ojo's equipment is able to map the movement of the proteins and track the time until the foam returns to a liquid state.

In all, that allows Ojo to track how long the batch lasts before it melts.

The team's work aims to make ice cream last longer, but also bring change by reducing food waste.

Martinez-Monteagudo knows these issues can't be solved with just one blanket, but he hopes his work can be a step in the right direction.

"Every improvement helps it doesn't matter if it's small or big, the subtle changes that people don't realize will be a lot easier to implement," professor Martinez-Monteagudo said. "I want to inspire or create awareness that there are ways to solve problems. I will not be one big solution at one time, it will be step by step."

Martinez-Monteagudo said working with the graduate students is why he got into into academia in the first place.

"The way I look at it is I'm working with the leaders of the next generation of leaders that this country needed that this place needs," professor Martinez-Monteagudo said. "With my students, I put a lot of attention on the mentoring aspect. How are you going to critically think about how are you going to solve a problem?"

Watch "Sweet Science" Thursday on ABC-7 at 6 p.m.