Thermal food processing computation software

Abstract

The objective of this research consisted of developing the two following thermal food processing software: “F-CALC” is software developed to carry out thermal process calculations based on the well-known Ball's formula method, and “OPT-PROx” is software for thermal food processing optimization based on variable retort temperature processing and global optimization technique. Time-temperature data loaded from Excel-file is used by “F-CALC” software to evaluate the heat penetration parameters jh and fh, as well as to compute process lethality for given process time or vice versa. The possibility of computing the process time and lethality for broken heating curves is included. The diversity of thermal food processing optimization problems with different objectives and required constraints are solvable by “OPT-PROx” software. The adaptive random search algorithm coupled with penalty functions approach, and the finite difference method with cubic spline approximation are utilized by “OPT-PROx” for simulation and optimization thermal food processes. The possibility of estimating the thermal diffusivity coefficient based on the mean squared error function minimization is included. The “OPT-PROx” software was successfully tested on the real thermal food processing problems, namely in the case of total process time minimization with a constraint for average and surface retentions the “OPT-PROx” demonstrates significant advantage over the traditional constant temperature processes in terms of process time and final product quality. The developed user friendly dialogue and used numerical procedures make the “F-CALC” and “OPT-PROx” software extremely useful for food scientists (research and education) and engineers (real thermal food process evaluation and optimization).