Rate My Professor Rewati Raman Bhattarai

Dr Rewati Raman Bhattarai serves as a Senior Lecturer in the School of Molecular and Life Sciences within the Faculty of Science and Engineering at Curtin University, Perth. He obtained his PhD in 2018 from the University of Queensland, Brisbane, elucidating the structure-property relations of plant cell walls. Following his doctoral studies, he worked as a Research Scientist for two years at the Australian Export Grains Innovation Centre in Western Australia, understanding wheat quality for various end products such as Asian noodles and bread, including their textural and sensory attributes. Earlier in his career, he held the position of Lecturer at Tribhuvan University, Nepal from 2013 to 2014 and served as a Teaching Assistant at the Nepal Academy of Science and Technology.

Specializing in food sciences, Dr Bhattarai's research focuses on understanding structure-function relationships in plant-based foods and designing novel sustainable ingredients for food, pharmaceutical, and biomaterial applications. His investigations explore innovative technologies to enhance techno-functionalities in plant proteins from cereals, legumes, and oilseeds, including extraction and purification of bioactive protein fractions as nutritional supplements, protein cross-linking for gluten-like properties in non-gluten sources, dry fractionation for efficient extraction of proteins, starch, and fibres, and methods to create fibrous structures in meat analogues such as extrusion and electrospinning. Additional interests encompass sustainable utilisation of Australian bush foods and food wastes for high-value ingredients. He completed an ARC-Linkage project as a Chief Investigator to develop the process for purification of the bioactive legume protein γ-conglutin as a nutraceutical for maintaining healthy blood glucose levels. Dr Bhattarai has secured major funding including an Australian Research Council Linkage Grant ($443k), industry funding ($257k), Innovation Booster Grant ($40k), Maitri Grant ($250k), Australian Synchrotron grant ($64k in-kind), SPARC grant ($147k), and Curtin-Malaysia CMRI-CRS grant ($17k). A patent is under development for an innovative method to produce allergen- and preservative-free, high-protein, stable plant-based milk alternatives. Key publications include 'Thermo-mechanical pre-treatments modulate the structure, protein and starch digestibility, and thermal and pasting properties of sorghum flour' (Food Chemistry, 2026), 'Effects of extrusion cooking on nutritional and health attributes of sorghum and millets' (International Journal of Food Science and Technology, 2025), 'A concise review of millet milk development' (Journal of Food Science, 2025), and 'Extraction, Isolation and Nutritional Quality of Coffee Protein' (2022).