Mathematical Modelling of the Heat Transfer and Microbial Inactivation During a Meat Pet Food Sterilization in Retortable Pouches

Abstract

Thermal process is still the most used and safer method for food preservation. Although the mathematical modelling of heat transfer has been used for thermal process evaluation, microbial validation is rarely carried out, and the evaluation of retortable stand up pouch processes were not studied. The present work employed a finite elements analysis model (FEA) for the evaluation of a conductive meat pet food process sterilization in stand up retortable pouches. The results obtained by the model showed good agreement with the experimental values, for both temperature histories and microbial inactivation comparison. The results obtained demonstrate the utility of using mathematical models for describing the heat transfer and microbial inactivation in food thermal process, and reinforce that it can be a powerful tool in food process evaluation and design.