Abstract
Microorganisms are predominantly responsible for food deterioration, necessitating the sanitization and removal of these entities from food surfaces. The packinghouse employs free chlorine in the sanitization process; however, free chlorine's propensity to react with organic matter, forming potentially toxic compounds, has led to its restriction or outright prohibition in several European countries. Therefore, this study aims to assess various washing methods, emulating packinghouse conditions, utilizing diverse forms of electrolyzed water to impede microbial proliferation and significantly enhance the food's shelf life. The subject of investigation was cherry tomatoes. The findings revealed that electrolyzed water containing NaCl exhibited superior efficacy compared to electrolysis with Na2SO4. Both forms of electrolyzed water demonstrated noteworthy effectiveness in inhibiting microorganisms, resulting in a reduction of 2.0 Log CFU mL−1 for bacteria and 1.5 Log CFU mL−1 for fungi. The electrolyzed water also exhibited a comparable capability to free chlorine in removing fecal coliforms from the tomato surfaces. Notably, both electrolyzed water treatments extended the shelf life of cherry tomatoes by at least three days, accompanied by minimal or negligible residues of free chlorine. Consequently, the electrolyzed water formulations proposed in this study present themselves as promising alternatives to traditional packinghouse sanitizers.
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The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding authors upon request.
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Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the funding support from: Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) – process 150092/2022-9. Carolina Rosai Mendes received a PhD scholarship from Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) – Brazil.
Funding
C. R. Mendes received a Ph.D. scholarship from Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)—Brazil. This work was funded by Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)—process 150092/2022–9.
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CRM and GD: carried out the experiments, conceptualization, methodology, validation, formal analysis, writing original draft; RNM: conceptualization, methodology, resources; EDB: conceptualization, visualization, writing/review and editing, supervision, project administration, funding acquisition.
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Mendes, C.R., Dilarri, G., Montagnolli, R.N. et al. Different electrolytic treatments for food sanitation and conservation simulating a wash process at the packinghouse. J Food Sci Technol 61, 879–887 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13197-023-05882-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13197-023-05882-1