Kotzekidou, Parthena
Prof. Dr. Parthena Kotzekidou is Professor of Food Microbiology at the Department of Food Science and Technology, Faculty of Agriculture, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. She received a B.S. from the Faculty of Agriculture of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, in 1976 and a Ph.D. degree in Food Microbiology from the Technical University of Munich, Germany in 1980. She was appointed Lecturer in 1981 and Professor of Food Microbiology at the Department of Food Science and Technology, Faculty of Agriculture, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece in 1998. Her research interests include detection of foodborne pathogens in ready-to-eat foods; application of starter cultures and protective cultures to improve the quality and safety of ready-to-eat foods; identification and characterization of microorganisms in foods; and microbial production of enzymes, carotenes and organic acids. Professor Kotzekidou has participated in several externally-funded research projects. She was visiting research scientist at the Department of Bioscience and Biotechnology, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK; the Institute of Bacteriology, Technical University of Munich, Weihenstephan, Germany; and the Institute for Food Science and Technology, University of Washington, Seattle, USA. She has published over 44 peer-reviewed articles in international journals and has more than 800 citations. She has co-authored several chapters in international books and holds two patents in the fields of carotenes production by microorganisms of the Greek Patent Office.