Irradiation

2/21/01 Food Irradiation: Solution to Hunger or Killer Mutagen? People all over the world are starving for fresh, uncontaminated food. Insects, pests, and invisible microorganisms are not what the public want to find on their dinner plates. Throughout history, life has depended on ways of treating food to reduce or destroy these naturally occurring harmful contaminants and to enable foods to be stored after harvesting so that they can be saved for use at other times of the year. With increasing

Food Irradiation: Solution to Hunger or Killer Mutagen? People all over the world are starving for fresh, uncontaminated food. Insects, pests, and invisible microorganisms are not what the public want to find on their dinner plates. Throughout history, life has depended on ways of treating food to reduce or destroy these naturally occurring harmful contaminants and to enable foods to be stored after harvesting so that they can be saved for use at other times of the year. With increasing populations

The first fundamental concept for food irradiation was patented over a hundred years ago in 1905, and yet it continues to be a relevant topic during discussions of more modern technologies such as genetic engineering or robotics (Spiller). Food irradiation’s continued significance is easily explained by looking back on its history fraught with constant battles for its widespread implication. This almost ancient technology has seen controversy up into the 21st century that rivals the safety debates

However there is another way to fight off bacteria and harmful organisms, and its food irradiation. Irradiation does not make food radioactive, compromise nutritional value or noticeably change the taste of food (“Food irradiation: What you need to know.”). Irradiated food is more expensive to produce due

3. Results and discussion 3.1. Physical characteristics 3.1.1. Effect of gamma-ray irradiation on sludge settleability In static sedimentation tests, a distinct sedimentation interface between the supernatant and sludge was observed for all samples with different irradiation doses, whereas the expected rapid improvement of the irradiated sedimentation rate was not observed (Fig. 1). These trends agreed with the results of Meeroff et al (2004). According to the sedimentation curves, there are two

food irradiation Table 1: Selected milestone history of food irradiation Year Events 1905 J. Appleby & A.J. Banks: British patent: “to bring about an improvement in the conditions of foodstuffs” and in “their general keeping quality by radiation of radioactive substances” 1957 First commercial application: electron beam irradiation of spices in Germany 1966 First International Symposium on Food Irradiation, Karlsruhe, Germany 1970–1982 International Project in the Field of Food Irradiation (IFIP)

Overview of the history of food irradiation practices in the United States from World War II era to the end of the 20th century, and speculation about its future commercial prospects. Researchers in the United States and Great Britain filed patents in 1905 for using ionizing radiation to kill food-borne bacteria (Spiller, J. (2004)). Therefore, food irradiation has over 100 years of history. Food irradiation (the application of ionizing radiation to food) is a technology that improves the safety

concentrations following irradiation in the current study, only the early increase in the AST level was significant (Fig. 9). ALT is also a marker of hepatic damage, and it is found exclusively in the cytoplasm of cells. In contrast, AST is present in the cytoplasm, which comprises 20% of its total activity, and in the mitochondria, which comprises 80% of its total activity (Rej 1989). While the recruited granulocytes and the gamma irradiation could damage some periportal hepatocytes, irradiation treatment may

tissue physiological function as observed in the present study. This was evidenced by significant elevation in kidney MDA content. These results match the increase in lipid peroxidation post irradiation obtained by Srinivasan et al. (2007) and Pratheeshkumar and kuttan (2011). Free radicals generated by irradiation react with unsaturated lipids generating hydroperoxides, which in turn can induce changes in lipid bilayer thereby altering the membrane permeability and inducing lipid peroxidation (Suzuki

who eat it. Some researchers, however, are still looking for safer and more effective ways to preserve food, and the idea of food irradiation has been around since the early 1900’s. Anything involving radiation often scared consumers and makes them not trust the quality of the food, because they do not believe that