Abstract
Pasteurization or sterilization is one of the essential processes carried out in the food industry for ensuring quality and for designing new products. At the sterilization process, new subjects arise one after another and we have been working on these issues consistently. In this article, we describe our approaches for improving continuous direct steam heating. The mixing length of steam in a steam injection system should be known to calculate the holding time required for precisely evaluating sterilization effect. We developed two methods for measuring this length and performed CFD analyses in order to fabricate practical sterilizers. For steam infusion system, we proposed a new method to determine the pasteurize conditions which have the same effect as plate systems which includes heating and cooling periods. We also approached for high-viscosity, adherent, and solid final products such as cheese. To produce cheese with stable physical properties, we measured the viscosity inline and developed a new direct steam heating system for heating and melting raw materials. Thus, by conducting research on sterilization technologies, which are fundamental in food manufacturing, we developed and improved the direct steam heating systems used in producing a large variety of products in the food industries.
