Abstract
Electrical conductivity in food and agricultural products is gaining attentions in response to ohmic heating and pulsed electric field processing, the newly emerging food processing technologies. Electrical conductivity of agricultural product is the ability of the products to conduct electric current. This paper is intended to review the electrical conductivity in foods in general and fruits and vegetables in particular. For this review to take its form, different articles, books and other possible sources have been reviewed, cited and acknowledged. So, this paper has been enriched by composition of the finding of different authors and researcher. Since measurement of electrical conductivity has number of application in agricultural products and food processing, methods of measuring this property is important. Measurement of electrical conductivity can be through dielectric analysis and electrical impendence spectroscopy measurement. In dielectric analysis high frequency area (100 MHz - 10 GHz) is used and this has an application in moisture determination and bulk density measurement. In electrical impendence spectroscopy, the range of frequency is from 100Hz to 10MHZ and is simple and easier techniques used to evaluate physiological status of various biological tissues. There are factors affecting electrical conductivity of agricultural products; electrical conductivity is reported by different authors to be increasing with temperature, field strength, and storage duration until the product is over ripe in case of fruits and vegetables. Plus, conductivity also found decreasing with increasing sugar content. The decrease in firmness of fruits and vegetables is related to increase in its conductivity. The nature of product and way of applying electricity is also other factors affecting conductivity. Electrical conductivity has number of application in foods, fruits and vegetable industries. However, still much work is expected for the utilization of its high potentials application.
Highlights
Electrical conductivity in food is the measure of how well the electric current flows through the food of cross-sectional area A, unit length L, and resistance R
Electrical conductivity of food is the properties of food itself
Pulsed electric field is emerging food processing technology in which high intensity electric field is applied for short duration of time
Summary
Electrical conductivity in food is the measure of how well the electric current flows through the food of cross-sectional area A, unit length L, and resistance R. The increase in interests of electrical conductivity which was immerged in recent years is mostly the response to the development of commonly two food processing technology; ohmic heating and pulsed electric field processing technologies [1]. Ohmic heating relies on flow of alternate current in food materials and this electricity in the form of wave is transformed to thermal energy and heat in the food by internal generation. Ohmic heating called electric resistance heating, joule heating or electro conductive heating is an advanced thermal food processing techniques, where heat is internally generated in sample due to electrical resistance when electric current is passed through it.
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