Enjoying rapid-fire, smart and fun repartee with science faculty,
students and a few former professors, Koziol, now an internationally
prominent educator and researcher, made the most of his first visit
back to campus since sailing for England and the University of
Oxford nearly 35 years ago. He also represented Oxford at the
inauguration of President John Neuhauser and spent time among
students and faculty for formal and informal occasions over three
days.
Among the world’s experts in food science, Koziol is founding dean
of the College of Agriculture, Foods and Nutrition at Universidad
San Francisco de Quito, Ecuador after 13 years heading the
Scientific Support Laboratories for the Nestle in Quito. Following
his Rhodes studies, he stayed at Oxford doing post-doctoral research
funded by the British government for several years, then decided he
would like to live in Ecuador based on beautiful photos he’d seen.
Knowing no Spanish at the time, he was glad to have always been a
fast learner. Now he delivers complex lectures in the language.
Koziol has vivid recollections of the day he went to Boston to be
interviewed by a panel of eminent former Rhodes Scholars from all
fields who would choose just four men from 12 candidates to
represent the Northeast region among the 32 scholars selected
annually nationwide.
Before he went, he was told that nobody from a Vermont college had
ever won a Rhodes and surely never would, so he should just relax
and enjoy the experience. Koziol, though very nervous, had other
ideas. “We had questions from politics to molecular genetics – they
could ask you anything at all – and it was frightening,” he
remembered. Other state’s finalists who had survived grueling
preliminary interview rounds represented the nation’s most elite
institutions.
“My way of dealing with anxiety is to fall asleep,” Koziol said. “So
I’m sitting with these other guys in the fancy gentleman’s club in
Boston waiting to be interviewed and I fell asleep in my chair. I
think it psyched the other guys right out, since they thought I was
super-confident,” he said with a laugh. “When they announced four
winners out of 12, they had to shake me to wake me up.”
Koziol’s Oxford thesis was “Effects of prolonged exposure to SO2 on
the growth and carbohydrate metabolism of soyabean and ryegrass.”
When funding dried up for his Oxford research after many years of
post-doctoral work, he looked to the private sector.
During his R&D work at Nestle in Ecuador, Koziol discovered “how
fascinating food chemistry could be.” He loved the challenges of
trouble-shooting and problem-solving in the manufacturing process of
different products. “When working with food, there’s such a complex
matrix — everything from biochemistry to physiology of taste and
aroma, and it’s just incredibly fascinating,” he explained.
Koziol’s move to full-time work at the university coincided with the
closing of the Nestle facility in Ecuador, and he became immersed in
every aspect of starting the new nutrition school from scratch,
helping design the facilities and curriculum. “That was an
all-encompassing job and I was only recently able to get back into
research,” he said, noting he’s been nine years “getting everything
organized according to an international standard of quality,” which
is his top priority. He insists his students learn by doing
practical, quality work.
Among fun facts Koziol shared in his guest lecture were that MSG
(monosodium glutamate) is not what makes people feel funny after
they eat Asian food as is commonly believed – rather, it’s the soy.
He thinks MSG is a great product, and showed how onions will brown
much faster when MSG is mixed in since it changes the cooking
chemistry. He also shared how, chemically speaking, the perfect
protein for humans to ingest would be other humans since it has
everything the body needs in just the right proportions.
His work has taken him to all corners of the globe, and he has
become an able chef, connoisseur and expert in various cuisines. He
participated in developing products such as Jungle Chili banana
chips for The Exotic Blends Company of Quito, for which he has
created a cookbook and Web site, and has developed four Exotic
Blends spicy sauces with names like Ginger Zinger and Andean
Delight.
