“TERMINATING” THE FERMENTATION PROCESS

Many food fermentation industries are facing the problem of when is the right time to terminate a fermentation process and how to terminate the fermentation process?. A fermentation process will keep going on and on until the substrate runs out or there are changes which occur in the fermenting food product which will lead to the slowing down and even the cessation of the fermentation process.
In many food and beverage fermentation once the desired fermentation product is achieved in terms of its nutritional, organo leptic properties, the fermentation broth or the product need to undergo downstream activities such as bottling and repackaging the product.
If the fermentation product is liquid or contain water, there is possibility that even after repackaging or bottling the fermentation process in the bottle or package might still continue. In view of this the continuing fermentation process might still continue changing the biochemical characteristics of the products.
In situation like this how the fermented product is kept under low temperature is important. It is important that the expiry date is adhered to
Then why don’t we just terminate the fermentation process itself? This is easier said than done. The question is how do we terminate the fermentation process? Will the process affect the quality of the fermentation product itself?
Many of the industries producing the fermentation products keep the secret of their fermentation process. Its not so much of the microorganism but the strains it used. They are not keen in allowing their strains in the fermentation products be released to public for free by just buying a few cents of yogurt.
It is important in their case that the strains used will die or becomes non viable once the fermentation is completed. How they do this is their trade secret. However a good microbiologist will be able to reisolate the strain 
Most of the fermentation process is ‘terminated’ by a few available technology such as manipulating the temperature or even using chemicals to inhibit the fermenting microorganisms without affecting the fermentation products.


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