The award committee for the 2026 Glenn Gibson Early Career Researcher Award is pleased to announce this year’s winner: Dr. Gabriela Fraiz, PhD, a nutritional science researcher who completed her doctoral training through a dual-degree program at the Federal University of Viçosa in Brazil and the University of Navarra in Spain. Dr. Fraiz’s work primarily focuses on the impact of a fermented beverage, kombucha, on human health.
After earning an MSc in nutrition science, Dr. Fraiz pursued doctoral training and completed a specialization in biochemistry and molecular biology applied to health. She says, “My interest in fermented foods and microbiology emerged during my training in nutritional sciences, particularly as I became involved in clinical research focused on obesity, metabolic health, and inflammation. Kombucha particularly caught my attention because this is a plant-based beverage with a rich composition full of phenolic compounds, organic acids and microorganisms, which represents an intersection between nutrition, microbiology, and food products with potential bioactive properties.”
In investigating how kombucha affects human health, Dr. Fraiz has led clinical trials on the impacts of kombucha in individuals with excess body weight, using multi-omic approaches to determine both systemic effects and changes in the salivary microbiota. By integrating microbiota data with serum metabolomics, she showed that kombucha consumption may generate bioactive metabolites potentially associated with the attenuation of inflammatory responses. Furthermore, she demonstrated the importance of dietary context by showing that the benefits of kombucha appear to be enhanced when the product is consumed as part of a minimally processed diet with greater antioxidant capacity.
Dr. Fraiz says, “I am particularly motivated by the potential of fermented foods to support health in a practical and accessible way, contributing to improvements in well-being and quality of life in different populations.”
She is also eager to translate scientific findings into insights for the general public. Dr. Fraiz has participated in television programs and contributed to newspaper articles, in addition to producing materials on fermented foods for local audiences.
In the future, Dr. Fraiz plans to continue her research with studies on how fermented foods and biotics may help metabolic disease.
The 2026 award committee recognized Dr. Gabriela Fraiz PhD for her forward-looking approaches to fermented food science and meaningful contributions at this early stage in her career. The Glenn Gibson Early Career Researcher Award, named in honor of ISAPP co-founder and longtime board member Prof. Glenn Gibson PhD, is given annually to a researcher who is less than five years past their terminal degree, in a field of study related to probiotics, prebiotics, synbiotics, postbiotics or fermented foods. Dr. Fraiz will receive a cash prize and will speak in person at the ISAPP annual meeting in October, 2026.
