Recommendations and guidelines for the description of cold atmospheric plasma devices in studies of their application in food processing

Abstract

In this article, we propose an approach to provide a schematic and exhaustive description of a Cold Atmospheric Plasma (CAP) process; particular focus is placed on defining and differentiating the operating conditions of a plasma discharge and the fundamental characteristics of the resulting processes.

After identifying the main techniques to characterise a CAP treatment, two fundamental analyses to support their study are described in detail: electrical analysis, presenting different methods together with the equipment required to properly perform the measurements, and chemical analysis of the gas phase, discussing optical absorption spectroscopy (OAS) as a quantitative technique that poses relatively low challenges in terms of equipment availability and elaboration of acquired data.

Finally, a practical example of a detailed description of a plasma device, its electrical characterization and its gas phase characterization by means of OAS will is provided.