Oumoule Ndiaye

Oumoule Ndiaye is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Food Science and Technology at Virginia Tech where she obtained her Master`s degree in 2016. Before coming to the United States from her home country of Senegal, she received an engineering degree in Agribusiness in 2010. She then worked for one year at SANOFI Aventis. She also worked and volunteered for three years at Institut de Technologies Alimentaires (Institute of Food Technology), a Senegalese research institute on food transformation, where she had the opportunity to apply for the USAID/ERA (United State Agency for International Development/Education and Research in Agriculture) program for Master`s degree study in the United States.

While completing her Master`s degree in the Food Science and Technology Department here at Virginia Tech, she applied for the Water Interdisciplinary Graduate Education Program. This allowed her to start her Ph.D just after she defended her Master`s degree. The Water INTERface IGEP program introduced her to techniques and strategies to follow when working collaboratively to address complex societal issues such as the access to safe drinking water that require interdisciplinary expertise. Her research focuses on hibiscus aroma and bioactive elements such as polyphenols and dietary fiber, which provide hibiscus with pharmacological properties including lowering blood pressure, antiinflammatory, anticancer, various applications in the food, pharmaceutical, and cosmetic industries. Her research also examines American consumers' knowledge of hibiscus products.

In parallel to her studies and research, she was accepted in the Graduate Teaching Scholar (GTS) program, and taught (instructor of record) FST 4014 Concepts of Food Product Development in Spring 2020 after co-teaching it the previous year. This course is a capstone course designed to help senior students integrate food science knowledge and training into real world projects.

Her short-term goal is to work in food or pharma where she can use her background and training to contribute to the success of interdisciplinary projects. Her long-term plans include: 1) joining academia or international organizations like the World Food Organization, 2) starting her own business/company in agribusiness while assisting Senegalese entrepreneurs (mainly women) carrying out small businesses in food transformation to be in compliance with international norms, since that is one of the challenging factors that limit their capacity to sell and export their production, and finally 3) she is sensitive to children's education conditions in Senegalese rural areas and plans to collaborate with local authorities in order to build libraries and implement activities that will help children to be more successful in school and keep their parents more involved in their education.

Outside of work, she loves watching news and documentaries, making Senegalese food, or doing her favorite sport, which is running. 

You can find out more about Oumoule and her work on her LinkedIn page.