Environmental applications, food and biomass processing by pulsed electric fields

Abstract

Pulsed electric field (PEF) treatment is a physical method which exhibits specific advantages over conventional processing in various applications and was proven for feasibility on pilot and industrial scale. For bacterial inactivation in wastewater and liquid food and for eradication of Cyanobacteria in surface waters, PEF-based techniques are demonstrated to be energy saving and persistent in efficacy without adding harmful chemicals and in particular do not cause adverse effects to food matrices or to the aquatic environment. For component extraction, the specific advantages of PEF treatment, i.e., low heat influx, low-energy demand, and selectivity of compound release, promote PEF processing in winemaking, extraction of sugar from sugar beets and valuable components from fruits and vegetables, and PEF-downstream processing of microalgae. These promising appli cations of PEF processing will be introduced in more detail in the following sections.