First and foremost, hurdle technology is used in industrialized as

well as in developing countries for the gentle but effective

preservation of foods. Basically,hurdle technology was developed
several years ago as a new concept for the production of safe,
stable, nutritious, tasty and economical foods.

From other aspect, hurdle is also a concept in which three or

more preservation parameter are employed in suitable combination
and every hurdle is used at optimum level so that damage to the
overall quality of food is kept minimum.

Example one of the technique that use Hurdle technology is milk

preservation. The reason why we apply Hurdle technology in milk
production to make milk last longer. The suitable food are mild and
also dairy products. The Hurdle can be use high temperature during
processing (F value). Thus, when we processing the milk, high
temperature is needed. Second, using low temperature (t value)
which are chilling and freezing. The next one is reduced the water
activity of the milk by drying and curing. Other than that, is the
addition of acid to the milk to increase the acidity also can be used.
The right combination of hurdles can ensure all the pathogens are
eliminated or rendered harmless in the milk.

In milk preservation, we use lactic acid bacteria due to their

ability to rapidly drop the pH in fermented foods and competitively
inhibit the growth of other microorganism which in part due to their
production of broad spectrum bacteriocins. Successful applications
have been reported for bacteriocins used with various non-thermal
hurdles including high hydrostatic pressure (HHP), pulsed electric
fields(PEF) and irradiation. HHP treatment disrupts hydrogen bonds
ionic bonds and hydrophobic interactions, which results in sublethal
damage to bacterial cell membrane that effects the function of
ATP-generating and transport proteins.