Viability study of baby food sterilization by ultra-high pressure homogenization

Identifier:  TFG:2965

Handle: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11797/TFG2965

Authors:  Molné Rioné, Mireia

Abstract:
Baby food products are products for infants and young children that are expanding worldwide and their innovation is focused on improving the quality and nutrition of these foods. Batch retorting and continuous thermal sterilization at ultra-high temperatures is currently used in baby food products, but it can cause negative effects on the organoleptic and nutritional quality of the products. There is high pressure thermal sterilization (ETAP) that has the limitation of operating by batch. But also ultra-high pressure homogenization (HUAP) which is a promising technology for continuous sterilization of liquid foods. In order to study the feasibility of sterilizing a vegetable-based liquid baby food product (smoothie), a bibliographic review on the use and effects of HUAP technology has been carried out and the sterilization process of a model baby food smoothie product has been designed by HUAP to study its potential. The results obtained in the selected studies demonstrated that temperature and pressure have a synergistic effect on microbial inactivation and that at operating conditions of 350 MPa and a product temperature before pressurizing (T in ) of 80 °C the spores of Bacillus amyloliquefaciens present an acceptable inactivation to achieve commercial sterility. These operating conditions will be used in the baby food smoothie product since this bacterial species will function as an indicator of the sterility achieved. Regarding the quality of the product, HUAP can present promising results in the preservation of the organoleptic and nutritional quality. However, the real scale of these results must be studied to determine how it affects this food matrix in question and deal with limitations such as packaging, industrial scale, acceptance of the indicator bacterial species and the European regulation of the product.