Mateusz Łużny from the Department of Chemistry of the Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences won the title of student-inventor in a nationwide competition organized by the Kielce University of Technology. The researcher was awarded for a series of 45 inventions regarding the production of flavonoid compounds.

Flavonoids are compounds produced by plants and possessing numerous health-promoting properties including antioxidant, anti-fungal, anti-bacterial, anti-viral and anti-tumor characteristics. Mateusz Łużny and his team have developed methods of obtaining flavonoids, characterized by high efficiency and significantly lower costs than with extraction from plants or chemical synthesis.

– I used yeast and entomopathogenic filamentous fungi (that is, attacking and being developed in insects) to make these compounds as catalysts. They produce such active enzymes that they transform substrates into those compounds within one to several hours – says the inventor.

More: http://www.glos.upwr.edu.pl/aktualnosci/50834/student_wynalazca_po_raz_trzeci_w_katedrze_chemii.html