Pulsed Electric Field Processing of Fruit Juices

Abstract Fruit juices and other liquid foods constitute an important source of bioactive compounds. However, the techniques used for their processing may cause alterations in their contents, and consequently they do not provide the benefits expected by the consumer. This fact has led to the increasing use of nonthermal processing technologies, such as pulsed electric field (PEF), which have been developed over recent decades as alternative technologies to thermal pasteurization of liquid foods. Researchers have previously studied the effects of PEF on the main compounds affecting the quality and the health-related properties. The reported results show that PEF could be used to pasteurize fruit juices with minimal modifications of the physicochemical and nutritional properties, or even a significantly higher amount of health-related phytochemicals.