The food preservation is a complex subject that cover multiple disciplines of natural and technical sciences. This Ph.D. thesis treats this subject under different points of view. The preservation involves the perceived and objective quality of food, monitoring of the quality and methods to achieve this task. The economical and energetic effort to achieve this task will be treated as well. All these variations on the preservation main-theme find place in the field of the green appliances of the domotic house. This work proposes as results a series of practical techniques and applications that alone or as a whole could significantly improve the quality and efficiency of the preservation of food, both for chemical and energetic aspects.
This Ph.D. activity is focused on energy saving and food preservation in the field of domestic and professional cold appliances. Refrigerators constitute a large energy demanding appliance; in particular household refrigerators cover the 15% of the domestic power needs. Their capillary spread and the 24 hours a day use justify this energetic demand and make important even the smallest energy efficiency improvement. From the other point of view in these appliances the cooling effect should be intended as their mean to achieve the preservation of food. A more coherent name should then be preservation appliances instead. From this consideration the cooling capacity shouldn't be the only purpose of these devices, they should also guarantee the best preservation performances. Temperature measurement and other means to monitor the quality of preserved goods should be integrated in the control loop.
