During her PhD studies, Fang Fang investigated how starch, plant cell walls (dietary fibre), and polyphenols interact within complex food matrices and how these interactions influence digestion and gut microbial fer-mentation. Rather than studying food components in isolation, or pair-wise interactions among these three components, her research focused on realistic three-way interactions that better reflect plant-based foods.

Using a controlled model system integrating chemically complex plant cell wall polysaccharides with a real-istic mixture of predominantly glycosylated polyphenols, assembled into supramolecular structures that mimic native cellulose deposition in plant cell walls, Fang demonstrated that the properties and bioactivities of dietary fibers, phenolics and starch are interdependent in products containing them, advancing our under-standing beyond pair-wise interactions among these three components.

The three-way interactions demonstrated in this study highlight the pivotal role of cell wall-polyphenol inter-actions in modulating starch functionality, digestibility, polyphenol stability and bioaccessibility, and micro-bial community dynamics in the colon, with competitive binding as a central mechanism. For example, the way polyphenols are incorporated into the food matrix was shown to shape fermentation rates, microbial di-versity, and short-chain fatty acid production.

The PhD study was completed at Department of Food Science, Faculty of Technical Sciences, Aarhus Uni-versity.

This résumé is prepared by the PhD student.

Time: Tuesday, 10 March 2026 at 13.00
Place: Agro Food Park 26, room 033, Department of Food Science, Aarhus University, Agro Food Park 48, 8200, Aarhus
Title of PhD thesis: Implications of three-way starch-cell wall-polyphenol interactions for component func-tionality, bioaccessibility, and colonic fermentability
Contact information: Fang Fang, e-mail: ff@food.au.dk, tel.: +45 91675755
Members of the assessment committee:
Professor Lilia Ahrné, Department of Food Science, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Professor Maria Manuela Pintado, Department of Biotechnology, Portuguese Catholic University, Portugal
Associate Professor Nina Aagaard Poulsen (chair), Department of Food Science, Aarhus University, Den-mark
Main supervisor: Associate Professor Mario Martinez Martinez, Department of Food Science, Aarhus Uni-versity, Denmark
Co-supervisor: Associate Professor Clarissa Schwab, Department of Biological and Chemical Engineering, Aarhus University, Denmark
Language: The PhD dissertation will be defended in English

The defence is public.
The PhD thesis is available for reading at the Graduate School of Technical Sciences/GSTS, Ny Munkegade 120, building 1521, 8000 Aarhus C.