An official website of the United States government.
Research, develop and implement a technique which will effectively and non-destructively pasteurize shell eggs for human consumption. The goal is to continue the work that has been focussed on the research os techniques to commercially pasteurize shell eggs. This phase of the project will address the scale up of the technique to allow practical implementation.
NON-TECHNICAL SUMMARY: The Michigan Research Institute is working with Pasteurization Technologies, LLC, the United States Department of Energy, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the United States Food and Drug Administration, (FDA), and the Illinois Institute of Technology to develop a highly effective method for pasteurizing shell eggs. To date tremendous success has been demonstrated in developing the technology and many of the technical risk hurdles have been surmounted. With the development of the commercial scale up the stage will be set to not only enhance Michigan's presence in a multi-million dollar global market, but as this method of egg pasteurization becomes the industry standard, it will directly and indirectly create new employment opportunities.
<P>
APPROACH: The technuque involves the use of microwave energy specifically applied to eggs which ensure pasteurization of the egg (a five log kill) but without affecting the quality or appearance of the egg to the consumer. These techniques have been researched and demonstrated effective in the laboratory. This phase of the project demonstrates that the technique can be scaled to a practical commercial throughput.