News
Carlos Diaz-Acosta

Kelly Fellner is still packing heat. The packaging science major has been on three winning RIT student teams in the past four years at the annual Paperboard Packaging Design Challenge. In 2018, she was part of the Packing Heat team that took first place for its subscription box filled with fiery sauces and treats.

The RIT student-designers on Team Frears placed second in the 2020 Paperboard Packaging Student Design Challenge for their packaging designs of a toolkit for educators to be distributed by the national program Trees into Cartons, Cartons into Trees, (TICCIT).

CNBC talks to Carlos Diaz-Acosta, associate professor of packaging science, about consumer behavior and food-waste education.

A federal grant matched by New York state and RIT is enabling university researchers to study a competitive solution to polyethylene mulch and identify a more sustainable alternative to conventionally used plastics in farming.

Team Pacman, a group of undergraduate students from Rochester Institute of Technology, placed second among 54 entries from competing universities in the recent Paperboard Packaging Alliance’s national Student Design Challenge.

Images of plastic bags and bottles clogging beaches and oceans have some calling for a ban on all such products. But packaging experts say it’s not that easy to eliminate a highly effective material. Instead, researchers at RIT are looking to strike a balance: Find a way to produce plastics that retain their best qualities and yet are more environmentally friendly.