In recent years, consumer trends on having healthy, convenient, and clean label foods are increasing. Researchers are working towards cutting-edge technology to provide solutions to deliver this. Traditional food technologies, such as pasteurization, high temperature sterilization, drying and evaporation, can guarantee the microbiological safety or stability of their products, but can destroy some of the food ingredients, especially the heat sensitive vitamins and polyphenols, which impacts the quality of the food.

Emerging technologies such as UV-light (UV), cold plasma, irradiation, Light Emitting Diode (LED), pulsed electric fields (PEF), high hydrostatic pressure (HPP), Ultrasound (US), Hydrodynamic cavitation and other hurdle technologies (HT) can ensure the sensory quality and nutrient values of food in shorter processing times and lower temperature conditions and still be used to enhance food safety and extend the shelf life of food product.

This Special Issue aims to cover these emerging technologies and its mechanism in food industry in recent, and to explore the potential application prospects of combining non-thermal treatments applied in food industry. Not only could this overcome the drawback of using a single technology but could also enhance the processing efficiency at lower treatment intensity. Innovative methods are being applied to producing and preserving, yet more systematic research is still needed to bridge knowledge gaps, in particular inactivation kinetics and mechanisms and food properties and composition, regarding any change in nutritional quality, sensory aspects, and activity or concentration of biomolecules. We welcome research articles and reviews that enhance our understanding about the use of new processing strategies that can improve the quality characteristics of food and prevent its loss due to deterioration.

Potential topics include but are not limited to the following:

• Cold plasma-based preservation for fresh produce
• Ozone as an effective technology for decontamination, stored product insects’ control, starch modification and pesticide degradation
• High-pressure processing role in pasteurization of liquid foods
• Ultrasonication for extraction and decontamination
• Light Emitting diode (LED) is an attractive technology for surface sterilization
• Pulsed electric fields (PEF) application in food products
• Oxidation technologies applications in food industries