The lethality rate, or F-value, in thermal processing is a measure of the heat treatment's effectiveness in reducing the population of a target microorganism, typically a heat-resistant pathogen like Clostridium botulinum. It quantifies the equivalent time in minutes at a specific reference temperature required to achieve a desired level of microbial inactivation. The F-value is calculated using an integral that considers both the temperature and time of the thermal process, accounting for the fact that microbial inactivatio....
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