Pulsed Electric Field treatment of packaged food

Abstract

Food manufacturers are looking for new preservation techniques that don’t influence the fresh-like characteristics of products. Non-thermal pasteurisation of food with Pulsed Electric Fields (often referred to as PEF) is an emerging technology, where the change of the food is less than with thermal pasteurisation. With this method, pasteurisation is realised by electroporation of bacterial membranes, which prolong the shelf-life of the product. Existing PEF treatment is based on the application of the electric field prior to packaging. To avoid re-contamination of the product during packaging, it is packed aseptically (i.e. sterile). The goal of this research is to determine whether it is technologically possible to generate enough electric field in already packaged food products. This will make aseptic packaging machines superfluous. During this research it has been proved that it is possible to generate sufficient electric field in already packaged products and to reduce the initial amount of bacteria with 99.9999%. For the realisation of this technique, which is called PEF in-pack, an electrically-conductive plastic packaging material is used. To reduce the required electrical power during treatment, the technique can only applied on relatively small deformable packages up to 200 ml. To show how this technique can be introduced into existing food production lines, product cases have been worked out. Portion packs for liquid food and pharmaceuticals, for example, are possible product applications.ESEElectrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Scienc