Food Processing

In addition to the more recent application of plasma processes in the pre-harvest area, i.e. in crop cultivation, the use of plasma-treated air and plasma-treated water is now a technology that is being closely followed commercially, especially in the post-harvest area, i.e. in food processing. The immediate objectives are to reduce food losses and increase food safety. The main focus is on investigating how plasma processes can be advantageously integrated into existing processing procedures. Examples of this are an immersion process to avoid storage losses in 'controlled atmosphere', i.e. CA storage, fruit marketing or washing processes in 'fresh-cut' production. Other activities include the development of 'cleaning in place' and 'sterilization in place' (CIP/SIP) processes in the packaging sector. The idea of using plasma to efficiently generate antimicrobial species, in particular radicals and metastables, is also being pursued. These are degraded within process-typical times, so that possible effects on the product can be minimized and any risk to the consumer can be excluded. The INP is involved as an active partner in various national and international projects in order to advance research activities relating to the development, production and marketing of plasma-based systems for the efficient, gentle decontamination of food, production equipment and their packaging.