Faculty Spotlight

Dr. Carolyn Ross
Professor, School of Food Science
Affiliate Professor, WSU School of Medicine
Director of the WSU Sensory Science Center

About Dr. Ross

Carolyn Ross is a Professor in the School of Food Science at Washington State University (WSU), Affiliate Professor in the WSU School of Medicine, and Director of the WSU Sensory Science Center. Since starting at WSU in 2004, Dr. Ross has established her lab and the WSU Sensory Science Center as a center for graduate student training in the areas of sensory science and analytical chemistry. Specifically, the overall objectives of Dr. Ross’ research and graduate education program are to understand the theoretical basis underpinning the sensory perception of foods and wines and correlate these attributes with quantifiable characteristics. Dr. Ross has also expanded her research to explore food texture perception in children. She has published over 130 research articles and presented at national and international conferences. Dr. Ross has three-times been awarded the Institute of Food Technologists Tanner Award for most‐cited article in the Journal of Food Science (sensory and food quality section). Dr. Ross was also recently awarded the WSU Faculty Excellence Award for Instruction and is currently a Fulbright-Australia Scholar at Deakin University in Melbourne (2023).

Experience with ADVANCE

Over the past few years, I had increasing interest to shift some of my research efforts into an area of food science which, while very important and I had a great deal of interest in, I had less experience with. I energetically embarked on a journey of reading and researching but what I thought would be even more beneficial is to develop a relationship with someone who had the expertise and knowledge that I was interested in learning. I found about the ADVANCE External Mentor program and thought that this was a great fit for what I wanted to accomplish. While I wasn’t a new researcher, I was in a new research area and would benefit having a more extended visit with someone in the field. I applied and received funding through the ADVANCE External Mentor program in 2019. I travelled to Deakin University in Melbourne, Australia for a one-week visit. During my visit, I met and chatted with my external mentor and this collaboration yielded a peer-reviewed research publication. My mentor also organized a symposium in the research area and through my presenting there, I met others in the research field. In 2022, I leveraged this collaboration in my application to the Fulbright Australia Scholar program. I could point toward the research publication with my external mentor as evidence of our productive research collaboration. This was made possible by the ADVANCE External Mentor grant as it provided the key first step in developing this relationship with the research group at Deakin University. I was awarded this Fulbright Award and am now (2023) at Deakin University in Melbourne continuing this research. If you have any questions or want to talk more about my experience, feel free to reach out – Carolyn Ross at cfross@wsu.edu

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