Ioannis Zabetakis

Ioannis Zabetakis, after having obtained his B.Sc. in Chemistry in the University of Athens, he spent 8 eight years in UK where he studied for a PhD in Food Chemistry in the University of Leeds, did post-doctoral research on alkaloids in the University of Durham and worked as a Lecturer of Food Chemistry in the University of Leeds. During his lectureship in Leeds, he studied towards a MEd in Food Science.

In 2001, he moved to Greece (national service 2001-03) where he held Academic positions as a Lecturer, Assistant and Associate Professor in Food Chemistry in the University of Athens (2003-2015). In Athens, he developed an independent research stream on the cardioprotective properties of food lipids and on ways to create novel feeds and functional food with improved activities against inflammation and cardiovascular diseases.
In 2015, he joined University of Limerick (UL) as a Lecturer in Food Chemistry and he was the Head of the department (HoD) of Biological Sciences in UL (September 2018-August 2023: 5 year term). Since 2020, he is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Food Chemistry.

During his term as HoD, he studied towards a professional diploma on “Strategic Leadership” in UL.

As HoD, Ioannis was instrumental in developing a new MSc course (MSc in Functional Foods and Product Development).
https://www.ul.ie/gps/courses/functional-foods-and-product-development-msc
Also, a number of successful recruitments of Faculty staff was achieved and the numbers of students pursuing studies in the Department of Biological Sciences (both at undergraduate and postgraduate levels) increased considerably.

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and related diseases (e.g. stroke and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) are the leading causes of death in the world. CVD alone cause 17M deaths in the world and 10k in Ireland, respectively, on an annual basis. Statins do nor lower the cardiovascular risk and also, they have strong negative side-effects, i.e, 50% of people on statins develop diabetes type-2 after 5 years of being on statins.
Ioannis is passionate on developing novel functional feeds, foods and nutraceuticals to help prevent or tackle CVD. This is the underlying reason why Ioannis has dedicated his research since 2000 on the impact of foods against CVD.

Since 2016, in Ireland, he has developed strong collaborations with food and nutraceutical companies and through them, he has developed two products, one nutraceutical supplement and a novel yoghurt drink, derived from ovine milk with both products having TRL 7.

In UL, Ioannis developed two research themes:
1. developing a new nutraceutical against CVD, using organic salmon, sourced in Ireland, in collaboration with Life’s2good (with the generous support of EI) and
2. studying the cardioprotective properties of dairy (bovine, ovine and caprine) – in collaboration with Irish dairy Industries. On this front, Ioannis has assessed the anti-thrombotic activities of polar lipids present in milk and yoghurt. Also, in collaboration with Rockfield Ltd with the financial support of EI, his team developed a novel yoghurt drink with strong anti-inflammatory and anti-thrombotic properties.

Ioannis has a particular interest on studying the properties of bovine milk using milk from grass-fed animals.

He has also a strong interest in valorising side-streams of food, animal and fish sectors of the food industry in order to produce novel animal and fish feeds with strong functionalities against inflammation.
During his posting in the University of Athens, he developed two patents in valorising olive pomace as a functional ingredient of fish feeds. In Ireland, he has developed strong collaborations with aquaculture and dairy companies and he is particularly interested in producing a novel nutraceutical and a new functional dairy product (e.g., yoghurt drink) with strong bioactivities against inflammation and the onset of CVD. His focus is also on valorising apple pomace and spent grain towards novel functional feeds and foods.

Food industry is facing many challenges and one of the main ones is how to render more sustainable the production of foods and feeds. Since 2010, Ioannis’ work is also dedicated on sustainability and food security and valorising side-streams is a strong way achieving these two targets, as shown at his publications below. By doing so, Ioannis believes that it is feasible achieving two targets at the same time, one on the sustainability front and the other one on the front of functional feeds and foods.