Chromatic Technologies Inc. (CTI), a producer of thermochromic ink, has launched BlindSpotz, a high pressure processing (HPP) verification technology that can identify individual packages that may have failed during the HPP process.
More and more food and beverage manufacturers are turning to high pressure processing (HPP) as a way to destroy harmful bacteria in food and beverages while maintaining their products’ natural flavor and keeping them free of preservatives. But one of the drawbacks in the HPP process has been its inability to inspect individual packages to identify where the HPP process may not have exerted enough pressure to kill pathogens in the products, forcing processors to eliminate an entire run of prepared foods or beverages following the vessel exposure to the HPP process. That can result in significant economic losses. CTI says its latest technology will address that inefficiency in the traditional HPP process.
CTI has developed its second-generation of printable BlindSpotz HPP verification technology. At the individual unit level, the CTI enhancements can differentiate between packages processed at 70,000 psi, 80,000 psi and 87,000 psi. The technology also identifies short cycles, such as packages at 87,000 psi for less than one minute.
A typical protein or juice product is processed through HPP at 87,000 psi for three minutes. Failure to hit that target pressure results in substantial risk of harmful contamination.
BlindSpotz HPP verification technology prints a clear message/image and then a blue color appears when the proper target is reached. To make it easy to use in a production environment, a reference color is used for comparison. If the HPP verification ink is lighter than the reference color, the package is easily identified as “failed” in the HPP process. For more rigorous or automated systems, the precision of a vision system is used to measure the color to ensure an objective analysis instead of human eyes.
