**About the Editors**

#### **Shaojin Wang**

Shaojin Wang received his bachelors and master degrees from Zhejiang University (P.R. China), while he received his PhD from Gembloux Agricultural University (Belgium). He worked at the Department of Biological Systems Engineering at Washington State University (WSU) for 11 years, and has been at the College of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering at Northwest A&F University since 2011. He is currently a Full Professor at this college and an Adjunct Professor at WSU. His major research areas include the thermal death kinetics of microorganisms, the thermal/dielectric properties of food materials, and radio frequency heating for pasteurization as well as disinfestation. He is an Editorial Board Member of seven SCI journals, such as *Transactions of the ASABE*, the *International Journal of Agricultural and Biological Engineering*, and so on. He has published more than 274 SCI papers, has more than 11296 citations, has an h-index of 61, and has given more than 20 invited keynote presentations. He is the PI of more than 12 projects, primarily supported by USDA-NIFA, the NSF of China, and Key R&D projects of the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology. He has been listed as a high-citation scientist in the agriculture and biology fields of China for 8 years by Elsevier.

#### **Rui Li**

Rui Li received her bachelors degree from China Agricultural University, her masters degree from Hokkaido University (Japan), and her PhD from Northwest A&F University (P.R. China). She has worked at the College of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering at Northwest A&F University since 2012; she is a Senior Scientific Researcher (equal to an Associate Professor) at this university. Her major research areas include radio frequency heating for pasteurization, disinfestation, drying, the thermal death kinetics of microorganisms, and the non-destructive testing of agricultural product quality. She has published more than 34 SCI papers. She is a reviewer of SCI journals, such as the *Journal of Food Engineering and the Journal of Food Process Engineering*. She is the PI of more than six projects, primarily supported by Key R&D projects of the Shaanxi Provincial Department of Science and Technology, the China Postdoctoral Foundation, and the Yulin Science and Technology Bureau.

## *Editorial* **Applications of Radio Frequency Heating in Food Processing**

**Shaojin Wang 1,2,\* and Rui Li <sup>1</sup>**

	- **\*** Correspondence: shaojinwang@nwafu.edu.cn

Considering safety concerns regarding postharvest agricultural products or foods, environmental pollution caused by chemical fumigations, and increased international regulations to limit the use of fumigants, it is an extremely urgent task to develop novel and environmentally friendly physical alternatives to the postharvest control of insect pests and pathogens. Radio-frequency (RF) treatment has been identified as a novel physical heating method, providing fast and volumetric heating. The purpose of this Special Issue is to focus on the recent developments and applications of RF heating in food and agricultural product processing, such as disinfestations, drying, pasteurization, sterilization, roasting, temping and thawing. This Special Issue aims to present the most significant methods, research strategies and protocols used in the development of environmentally friendly food processing based on RF energy.

This Special Issue collates 13 papers related to RF processing technology. The thermal and dielectric properties of agricultural products [1] are important for understanding RF heating principles and necessary for establishing a computer simulation model to improve RF heating uniformity in foods [2,3]. RF drying has been widely used to replace conventional dehydration methods for improving product quality and storage stability [4–6]. Based on thermal inactivation kinetics, RF energy has been applied to control pests and pathogens [7–9] in foods and agricultural products, shortening treatment time but maintaining product quality [10]. RF heating could also be used in the food industry to roast nuts since RF-roasted almonds were found to have a better flavor, texture, and overall preferability compared to commercial almonds [11]. Finally, RF heating has been successfully used for the tempering and thawing the frozen foods by reducing the drip and micronutrient losses [12,13].

In this Special Issue, we hope to establish a sound basis for the further development of thermal methods for the RF control of pests and pathogens, as well as the drying, roasting and thawing of foods and harvested agricultural commodities. This Special Issue will form an important resource for readers who are interested in the knowledge, methods and strategies used in the development of environmentally friendly RF processes. This Special Issue may also be suitable for researchers who work on heating technologies relevant to RF all over the world.

The editorial team would like to express its gratitude to the contributors for sharing their novel ideas, new knowledge, and innovative findings. Each paper has been handled by a qualified editorial team and reviewed by two international experts in RF fields. Therefore, we thank those reviewers for helping us maintain a high standard in the Special Issue. We hope to maintain a strong understanding, collaboration, and friendship with our colleagues across disciplinary, institutional, and country border lines.

**Author Contributions:** S.W. wrote the first version of the manuscript; R.L. revised the manuscript. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** This research was funded by National Foreign Expert Project, Ministry of Science and Technology, China (DL2022172013L, G2022172003L).

**Citation:** Wang, S.; Li, R. Applications of Radio Frequency Heating in Food Processing. *Foods* **2023**, *12*, 1133. https://doi.org/ 10.3390/foods12061133

Received: 27 February 2023 Accepted: 7 March 2023 Published: 8 March 2023

**Copyright:** © 2023 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).

**Institutional Review Board Statement:** Not applicable.

**Informed Consent Statement:** Not applicable.

**Data Availability Statement:** Not applicable.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.

#### **References**


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