Thawing of Foods in a Microwave Oven: I. Effect of Power Levels and Power Cycling

摘要

Microwave thawing is faster than other methods, but it can produce significant non-uniformity of heating. The objective of this study was to perform comprehensive experimentation and heat transfer modeling to relate the time to thaw and the non-uniformity of thawing to power cycling, power level and the surface heat transfer coefficient. The governing energy equation was formulated with an exponential decay of the microwave flux from the surface. Surface microwave flux was obtained from the measured temperature rise using inverse heattransfer analysis.