Dr. Ken Swartzel, William Neal Reynolds Professor, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, has been honored with the Institute of Food Technologists’ 2008 Myron Solberg Award.

The annual award honors an IFT member for providing leadership in establishing, developing and continuing cooperative efforts among industry, government and academia. It was presented at IFT’s Annual Meeting and Food Expo in New Orleans June 28-July 1. The award includes a $3,000 honorarium and a plaque. The Institute of Food Technologists is a not-for-profit international society with 22,000 members working in food science, technology and related professions.

Swartzel, 2006 winner of the Alexander Quarles Holladay Medal for Excellence and former head of what is now the Department of Food, Bioprocessing and Nutrition Sciences, directs the Food Systems Leadership Institute, a leadership development program sponsored by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges.

Swartzel founded the National Science Foundation Center for Aseptic Processing and Packaging Studies in 1987. He is currently working with eight other universities to form another NSF center called the Center for Biomass Processing Research.

More than 80 companies, foundations, government agencies or universities have worked together on one or more of the projects or programs led by Swartzel. He received his bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees from N.C. State.

— Dave Caldwell