Cold Plasma Treatment for Food Safety and Quality

Dear colleagues,

To address the challenge of combining global security with the increasing demand for high quality products in the modern food chain, non-thermal technologies represent an emerging opportunity. Cold gas plasma has shown promising results for food sanitation and stabilization, although the effects of its usage are not completely known. In this direction, it is important to identify the treatment parameters that are crucial for obtaining the desired effects, and also the points when further application of cold gas plasma becomes detrimental for specific food categories, not only in terms of their sensorial quality, but particularly on nutritional aspects. The degradative phenomena of food can be vary significantly, being strictly bound to the food products’ nature and characteristics (e.g. vegetable or animal origin, water activity, pH, composition, microstructure), and storage conditions (e.g. packaging permeability, oxygen availability, cold chain). The effect of cold gas plasma treatment in each case has to be known on the basis of their physico-chemical and biological mechanisms, also considering their further development during storage. In order to complete this major task, detailed models have to be developed and extensive diagnostics of plasma systems need to be done. Recently, the application of cold plasma to model and real systems has been investigated in relation to sanitation of different fluid and solid vegetable and animal foods, sterilization of food packaging materials, modification of surface and functional properties of food and food components, enhancement of seed germination, reduction of pesticide residues, inactivation of enzymes etc., mycotoxins decontamination.

The aim of this Special Issue is to review the potential applications of cold plasma technology for food modification/stabilization, widen comprehension of the effects of this promising technology, and underline the areas that need further investigation.

Scope

Authors are encouraged to submit original and previously unpublished research papers and reviews regarding cold plasma application to food systems.

Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• Characterization of cold gas plasma effects on quality and stability of animal and vegetable food products: enzymatic activities, physical properties and micro-structure, microbial load, bioactive compounds content and antioxidant activities;
• Cold gas plasma treatment for minimally processed food stabilization, pre- and post-packaging;
• Test of cold gas plasma treatment for micotoxyn inactivation in dried/semi-dried food;
• Modulation of atmospheric treatment conditions for the optimization of cold gas plasma processing of food products;
• Design and applications of novel plasma sources

Prof. Dr. Pietro Rocculi
Dr. Tappi Silvia
Prof. Dr. Lucia Vannini
Dr. Matteo Gherardi
Guest Editors

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