Effect of Ozone Treatment Exposure Time on Oxidative Stability of Cream Milk

Milk cream is a fluid milk product comparatively rich in fat, in the form of an emulsion of fat-in-skimmed milk, obtained by physical separation from milk, and widely used in the food industry. This study aims to evaluate the consequences of ozone treatment exposure time on lipid oxidation of milk cream, using peroxide value (PV) and thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS) methods. Ozonation process significantly affects PV and TBARS value (P < 0.05), in particular, the lipid oxidation increases with the ozone exposure time. The color characteristics (L*, a*, and b* values) of milk cream samples are also affected by ozone treatment (P < 0.05); the decrease of color parameters can be related to carotenoids degradation due to ozone treatment. Practical applications: Although ozone treatment is an extremely useful method to reduce the microbiological load of foods, the duration of ozone treatment is a key factor to determine the capacity of the ozonation process to balance microbial and chemical quality of foods.