Consumers’ desire for nutritious foods and industry interest in safe, more energy-efficient, high-throughput processes have led to advanced food sterilization technologies such as microwave-assisted thermal sterilization (MATS) and pressure-assisted thermal sterilization technologies (PATS). In fact, sterilization of in-packaged foods using microwave systems has already been commercialized in Europe and Japan.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture and th…