Assoc.Prof.Dr. NUTTHACHAI PONGPRASERT, lecturer at the School of Bioresources and Technology (SBT), KMUTT, as the leader of the research team and developer of a fruit and vegetable washing machine with micro-nanobubble gas bubble technology, said that the production process Ready-to-eat pre-cut fruits and vegetables are essential to ensuring that they are clean and safe for consumption. Especially safe from contamination from disease-causing microorganisms. In addition, because the cut salad vegetables are ready for consumption, Must go through various steps, including tearing, slicing, and trimming, which in those steps causes wounds which various substances within the cells come out from the wound caused by cutting Affects the acceleration of physiological and biochemical changes. and the rapid growth of contaminating microorganisms This causes rapid deterioration, resulting in a shorter shelf life. and resulting in economic damage, especially exports to foreign countries.
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For using micro-nano bubble technology Or a machine that produces air bubbles that are small at the micro-nano level to be used with Phulae pineapple. Assoc. Prof. Dr. NUTTHACHAI said that because ready-to-eat pre-cut vegetable or fruit products must not be contaminated with microorganisms or germs. cause disease Exceeds the standards set by the FDA, such as E. coli, yeast, salmonella, etc. because it is something that can be consumed immediately. Therefore, it must go through a very good cleaning process. The outstanding feature of micro-nano bubbles is the air bubbles that are created from them. It has a very small size. It is stable and can be dispersed in water for a long time. And has a high area per volume, increasing the ability to dissolve any substance or gas. Used for disinfecting, put into the washing water, such as chlorine compounds, ozone gas, etc., increasing the efficiency of washing and cleaning well and efficiently. Reduce the use of chemicals and reduce wastage of water used for washing as well.
The benefits of microbubble technology are obvious. That is, it can help reduce production costs, reduce labor use, reduce washing time, reduce the amount of water used from normal washing having to change the water every time. But water using microbubble technology can be reused frequently. Resulting in reducing the use of resources, reducing the use of chemicals by half from the original need to add chlorine to the water to kill microorganisms in the proportion of 100%. But if microbubble technology is included, only chlorine will be used. 50%, while the cost of microbubble technology is a fixed cost and compared to imported fruit and vegetable washing machines that do not use microbubble technology, it is still cheaper than putting water into the vegetable washing machine. half foreign fruit
This is from the knowledge of micro-nano bubble technology that KMUTT has been conducting research studies continuously for more than ten years. In addition to transferring this knowledge to agencies and interested people in various regions, we have also developed machines and methods for using microbubble technology for the private sector, such as orchid export companies. and a company that washes pre-cut vegetables ready for consumption Used to extend the freshness of produce. which the results found The company that received the technology transfer was able to reduce costs from the washing process and product loss by more than 1 million baht per year. From such success, the results were expanded with the Phulae pineapple processing factory, Chiang Rai Province, to be piloted in the region. above Results from a 2-year experiment with Better Fruits Company Limited found that this technology can help reduce the amount of microbial contamination in ready-to-eat pre-cut Phulae pineapples by 30% compared to the traditional method. and reduce the amount of chemicals used for disinfection by more than 50%. The research team expects that after this, the micro-nano bubble technology will be put into practice in other industrial sectors in the future.
