Postharvest Quality and Safety in Fresh-Cut Vegetables and Fruits

Objective

<OL> <LI> Develop, evaluate, and standardize subjective and objective quality evaluation methods in intact and fresh-cut vegetables and fruits. <LI>Develop new strategies to maintain fresh-cut product quality. <LI>Improve understanding of biochemical, physiological and molecular mechanisms that affect fresh-cut product quality. <LI>Evaluate and control unintentional and intentional microbial contamination of intact and fresh-cut produce.

More information

NON-TECHNICAL SUMMARY: Contamination of fresh-cut vegetables and fruits is a significant source of food borne illness, especially recently. The purpose of this project is to evaluate new methods and materials to reduce contamination in fresh-cut produce.
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APPROACH: We will evaluate various antimicrobial washing methods (ozone, peroxyacetic acid, chlorine, etc.) with various gas mixtures used in fresh-cut packaging (nitrogen/CO2 variables), with various packaging films that result in enhanced product safety and greatest potential shelf life, for various types of fresh-cut vegetables.

Investigators

Orton, Thomas

Institution

Rutgers University

Start date

2006

End date

2010

Funding Source

Nat'l. Inst. of Food and Agriculture

Project number

NJ22201

Accession number

212531