Eur. Phys. J. Appl. Phys. (2015) 71: 20811
https://doi.org/10.1051/epjap/2015140487

Black pepper powder microbiological quality improvement using DBD systems in atmospheric pressure^*

¹ West Pomeranian University of Technology, Szczecin, Faculty of Food Sciences and Fisheries, 70-310 Szczecin, Poland
² West Pomeranian University of Technology, Szczecin, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, 70-310 Szczecin, Poland

^a e-mail: mholub@zut.edu.pl

Received: 11 December 2014
Revised: 19 February 2015
Accepted: 6 May 2015
Published online: 15 July 2015

Abstract

Preliminary results are given regarding black pepper powder decontamination using dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma in atmospheric pressure. Three different DBD reactor constructions were investigated, both packaged and unpackaged material was treated. Due to potential, industrial applications, in addition to microbiological results, water activity, loss of mass and the properties of packaging material, regarding barrier properties were investigated. Argon based treatment of packed pepper with DBD reactor configuration is proposed and satisfactory results are presented for treatment time of 5 min or less.