Pulsed Electric Field for Food and Agriculture Applications:

An Electrical Engineering Aspect

Dr. Tanya Kirilova Gachovska

Treating foods with a pulsed electric field (PEF) results in minimal changes to the sensory and nutritional quality of foods. It has been widely used for pasteurization, extraction, and drying.  PEF is a nonthermal method of preserving liquid and semiliquid food products by exposing food products to a high electric field (>30 kV/cm) at relatively low temperatures for very short time, typically on the order of microseconds. PEF treatment of plants will enhance juice yield, and a combination of PEF and a specific pressing method may enhance juice extraction. The juice obtained from PEF-treated plants contains more phytochemicals and other valuable chemicals compare to untreated plants. Also, PEF can be used to accelerate the dying process of plants and enzyme inactivation, thus eliminating a blanching step. PEF treatment can be used to improve the cutting surface of plants.  Different uses for PEF application and the treatment parameters will be given, and the results of experiments will be discussed.