Cold plasma technology for fruit based beverages: A review

The increase in demand of fresh like food products requires the development of novel non-thermal processing and preservation technique which can produce food products with minimal changes in its quality properties. This has drawn attention of researchers towards cold plasma technology since last decade. Cold plasma is an emerging technique and has huge potential to reduce the unacceptable thermal effects on nutritional and quality characteristics of food products. To appreciate the potential opportunities of cold plasma in beverage industry, it is important to study it's effect on different constituents which are summarized in the present review article. Cold plasma is promising technique which shows several advantages in retaining the quality properties of fruit beverages. This review article focus on the fundamentals, sources and the recent trends in the processing of cold plasma treated beverages. Cold plasma has potential for preventing the growth of spoilage micro-organisms, inactivation of various endogenous enzymes while retaining physico-chemical properties of fruit based beverages. The paper presents the effect of plasma on bioactive compounds which shows the strong effect of plasma exposure time on beverages. However, due to less exposure time, cold plasma has no significant effect on the quality parameters of beverages. The review also highlights future research needs regarding the complex mechanisms of interaction with plasma species.