Joint development of China-Chic beauty cosmetics and daily cosmetics with lark | When practicing in summer, I like to smell oriental tea and take Yunnan Shilixiang ancient tea

Can the pure natural aroma of Eastern tea only exist in tea leaves? Can chemical methods be used to naturally extract and reduce it in derivative products?

During the summer vacation, Professor Wang Limin from the School of Chemistry at East China University of Science and Technology led a team of Yunnan students from the "Ten Li Hua Xiang" practice team, who traveled thousands of miles to Kunming to carry out summer social practice. They went to the Ten Li Xiang Tea Factory in Shilin Yi Autonomous County for research, visited older generations of tea enthusiasts, and reached further cooperation intentions with Ten Li Xiang Tea, further applying the intangible cultural heritage tea fragrance to beauty and daily chemical products.

Visiting the Shili Fragrant Tea Processing Workshop

Jiefang Daily's Shangguan News reporter learned that Shili Xiangcha is one of the high aroma teas in Yunnan, with a long cultivation history that can be traced back to the Tang Dynasty. "The Ming and Qing dynasties were prosperous and once served as tribute tea bases." According to the "Kunming City Annals", "one should eat the water from Wujing and drink tea with a fragrance of ten miles.". There is also a folk saying that goes, "A cup of ten mile fragrance fills the whole house with fragrance.".

However, in the early 1990s, due to urban construction and rapid development, tea gardens were converted to other uses, and the existing ten mile fragrant old tea trees were almost destroyed. Fortunately, Professor Zhang Fangci from the Tea School of Yunnan Agricultural University saved and protected them, and it was only then that ten mile fragrant tea was able to flourish.

Zhang Xin leads team members to pick tea

During the research period, team members interviewed General Manager Zhang Xin and Ms. Zhang Tianxuan, inheritors of the intangible cultural heritage of Ten Li Xiang Tea. They not only tasted Ten Li Xiang Tea, but also learned about the tea brewing process. They also went to the tea garden to experience tea picking and tea making, especially the complete production process of Ten Li Xiang black tea: withering, rolling, fermentation, and drying.

Through the comparison of ordinary tea extraction and component analysis, they found that the aroma components of Shilixiang tea are more abundant than ordinary tea, resulting in a richer sensory aroma. The content of geraniol and linalool in ordinary black tea is significantly lower than that in Shilixiang black tea, while the content of some characteristic aroma components such as geraniol and jasmine in Shilixiang green tea is also higher than that in ordinary green tea.

During the research, Professor Zhang Fangci told his team members his story: in 1953, Zhang Fangci, who was currently studying in university, responded to the central call and came to Yunnan to support border construction. According to the actual situation in Yunnan, the main approach is to restore and develop production, reclaim abandoned tea gardens, and then promote development. In the 1970s, the provincial government proposed to persist in running universities and cultivating their own talents. So Zhang Fangci came to organize and established the "Tea Mulberry" department at Yunnan Agricultural University.

In 1955, Zhang Fangci learned about Ten Mile Fragrant Tea through scholars Cai Xitao and Liu Youboring. At that time, the Ten Mile Fragrant Tea had basically been eradicated and burned down, with only a few tea trees in its original place and no one managing the tea gardens, creating a barren area. In a precarious situation, Zhang Fangci decided to preserve this historical famous tea and carried out research work such as seed preservation and breeding.

Over the following decades, Professor Zhang carefully nurtured Shilixiang and finally cultivated mature Shilixiang 1 and 3 varieties from 8 types in 2005. In 2008, with the support and assistance of the municipal and county agricultural bureaus, a 100 acre Ten Mile Fragrant Tea Protection Base was established in Shilin, and Ten Mile Fragrant Tea was finally effectively protected.

Technical exchange between Professor Wang Limin, Professor Zhang Fangci, and General Manager Zhang Xin

Professor Zhang Fangci told teachers and students, "I hope to use your professional knowledge to develop new uses and further improve the development level of the tea industry." Fan Kexun, the leader of the practice team, said, "I also hope to use my own strength, combined with chemical professional knowledge, to develop and promote Ten Mile Fragrant Tea."

Under the "specialized and creative" education model of Huali University of Chemistry, several members of the practical team from Yunnan returned to their hometowns to study the Shili Xiang tea industry chain from multiple aspects such as planting technology, production process, and enterprise development. They come from related majors such as applied chemistry, biochemistry, and fine chemical engineering, and combine their professional knowledge with tea production practice.

This practice team took raw materials such as tea leaves, tea seeds, camellia, black tea, green tea and so on back to the laboratory to extract tea essential oil and tea fragrance, which can be used to develop downstream products, such as tea perfume, tea seed oil lipstick, tea polyphenol hand cream, tea tree essence hair conditioner, alpine camellia facial mask, amino acid facial soap and other cosmetics, as well as daily chemical products such as tea powder washing bags, tea based hand sanitizer, tea function toothpaste, and bring consumers a new sensory experience through featured ethnic packaging and comic book publicity.

Professor Wang Limin introduced that the practice team is currently jointly developing China-Chic Beauty Daily Chemical Co., Ltd. with oriental tea fragrance with Shanghai Baichiling Daily Chemical Co., Ltd., establishing cooperative relations between upstream and downstream enterprises of ecological tea production, further strengthening regional cooperation between Yunnan and Shanghai, deepening cooperation between enterprises and universities, and promoting Chinese tea culture through industry university research cooperation.