Novel Thermal Sterilization Technologies in Seafood Processing

Thermal sterilization is one of the most common methods for producing safe and convenient fish products with an extended shelf life. However, the process of canning or "commercial sterilization" at high temperatures for long periods of time usually causes the deterioration of seafood quality such as flavour, aroma, and texture, among other attributes. Minimizing these quality losses during thermal processing to provide an adequate process with a desired sterility is one of the challenges of the canning industry and to improve those quality attributes. Therefore, alternative or novel processing technologies to sterilize seafood as well as other foods have aimed to use the technologies that have the potential to substantially reduce damage to nutrients and sensory components by way of reduced heating times and optimized heating temperatures while using less energy. In this chapter, some of these novel technologies such as agitated retorting (the Shaka Process®, Shaka, London, England), microwave assisted thermal sterilization (MATS), and pressure assisted thermal sterilization (PATS) for sterilizing seafoods will be discussed.