ABSTRACT
Introduction ........................................................................................................ 471
Materials and Methods ..................................................................................... 472
Preparation of Starch Gels........................................................................ 472
Characterization of Starch Gels ............................................................... 473
Macroscopic Characterization ......................................................... 473
Structural Characterization .............................................................. 473
Microscopic Characterization .......................................................... 473
Molecular Characterization.............................................................. 474
Statistical Analysis ............................................................................. 474
Results.................................................................................................................. 474
Macroscopic Properties ............................................................................. 474
Structural Properties.................................................................................. 476
Microscopic Properties.............................................................................. 478
Molecular Properties ................................................................................. 481
Conclusions......................................................................................................... 481
Acknowledgments ............................................................................................. 481
References ........................................................................................................... 481
High pressure processing (HPP) is becoming a popular tool in food industry
not only to reduce microbial load but also to induce physical changes in the
constituents of food products. Starch gelatinization can be induced by HPP
at pressure .300 MPa (depending on starch type and HPP time). HPP-
induced gels were reported to maintain a somewhat intact granular struc-
ture and present a lower degree of retrogradation and of freezable water
(Ezaki and Hayashi, 1992; Stolt et al., 2001; Baik et al., 2003). Gels produced
by HPP are expected to develop different physico-chemical properties that
might account for the greater stability of these gels.