No abstract

Pasteurization methods using pulsed electric fields (PEFs) have proved efficient at non-thermal inactivation of microorganisms and pathogens. The methods usually use a series of high intensity, narrow band electric fields that pass through target mediums where they induce irreversible damage to cellular membranes leading to the death of microorganisms by internal content loss breakage of cell homeostasis and other effects. This research proposed a simple, lab-scale PEF pasteurization equipment that uses common output electric voltages (220V and 110V, which provide electric power of 5.5 and 2.75 kV/m, respectively) with a simple designed Human-Machine Interface control. At a voltage of 110V, the equipment was tested with non-sterilized Czapek medium which showed more than 1.42-log reduction in the microbial density at 30s of the treatment and temperature below 60 o C. A test on suspended E. coli in modified Czapek medium also indicated an inactivation of most of bacterial cells after 40s of the treatment. We then applied the equipment to pasteurize fresh sugarcane juice and, as a result, the content of native microorganisms in sugarcane juice was reduced 1.2-log cycle, compared to that of original juice before the treatment.

Drug addiction is a historical issue in Vietnam. Although Vietnam has a long history as a producer of opium poppies and crossroads for the illicit drug trade, it is now has some of the most stringent drug laws in the world. Vietnam has shown some success in reducing the production, trade, and transportation of narcotics. There has also been a shift in the attitudes of lawmakers and government authorities toward viewing drug abuse as a health problem rather than a social vice. Educating and encouraging citizens to collaboratively reduce drug use has also proven effective. However, despite these changes, the number of people who use drugs has increased in recent years. The US, too, has also experienced an increase in illicit opioid use. The Trump administration declared opioid addiction a public health emergency and has established goals to address the crisis. The results of these efforts have also been uneven. This article reviews Vietnam’s efforts to tackle its opioid epidemic, with the goal of identifying areas where Vietnam’s approach to opioid addiction may be improved. A brief overview of efforts by the U.S. government, an important foreign partner for Vietnam in the control of illicit opioids, serves to demonstrate the difficulty of treating opioid use in different political systems.

Computer vision has been currently a new trend in developing new tools for automatic real-time quality control process in food drying. During drying process, the size and shape of mango slides are critically changed. These changes usually determine the sensorial value of products, as well as which drying conditions would be needed to obtain the highest quality of dried products. In this study, we report on the development of a computer vision tool, requiring a normal digital camera installed, to evaluate the changes in size and shape of mango slides during the drying process. The technique is expected to replace the observation with human eyes to evaluate the changes of food products during the drying process, which might not be able to provide reliable and consistent judgements all the time. Image of drying mango slide is taken by a digital camera, then the feature extraction is implemented. The area of mango slice is determined by the area ratio via the pixel number counting and the comparison to an original sample with predefined reference size. The shrinkage deformation is evaluated by elliptical fitting to develop the automated utility. The utility is built on MATLAB platform. The variations in size and shape of the mango slices during a convective drying process with different processing conditions are examined and acquired by the built software which achieves real-time performance on the personal laptop.