Medical Design and Outsourcing

  • Home
  • Medical Device Business
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Financial
    • Regulatory
  • Applications
    • Cardiovascular
    • Devices
    • Imaging
    • Implantables
    • Medical Equipment
    • Orthopedic
    • Surgical
  • Technologies
    • Contract Manufacturing
    • Components
    • Electronics
    • Extrusions
    • Materials
    • Motion Control
    • Prototyping
    • Pumps
    • Tubing
  • Med Tech Resources
    • DeviceTalks Tuesdays
    • Digital Editions
    • eBooks
    • Manufacturer Search
    • Medical Device Handbook
    • MedTech 100 Index
    • Podcasts
    • Print Subscription
    • The Big 100
    • Webinars / Digital Events
    • Whitepapers
    • Video
  • 2022 Leadership in MedTech
    • 2022 Leadership Voting!
    • 2021 Winners
    • 2020 Winners
  • Women in Medtech

A new use for ultrasound: Quality inspection for Belgian chocolate

June 2, 2016 By Abigail Esposito

Ultrasound chocolate

“We’ve discovered that we can detect differences in the crystallisation of cocoa butter with ultrasonic waves,” said Van Den Abeele. “The new technique involves sending transversal ultrasonic waves through the cocoa butter. The researchers then measure the reflection of these waves for information about the structure of the butter.” Image source: www.flanderstoday.eu

Belgian chocolate is a world-famous delight. But producing a divinely delicious bar of chocolate that has a beautiful gloss, makes that wonderful sound when you break it, melts in your mouth and maintains all these qualities throughout its entire shelf life, is not easy. The crystallisation of the cocoa butter—the fat in the chocolate—plays an important role in that process.

“Cocoa butter crystallises as the liquid chocolate hardens. Five types of crystals can be formed during this process, but only one of these has the qualities we want,” said Prof. Imogen Foubert from the KU Leuven Department of Microbial and Molecular Systems. “The number, size, shape and the way in which the crystals stick together play an important role as well. It is therefore crucial to monitor the crystallisation of the cocoa butter closely during the chocolate production process, because we don’t want inferior chocolate ending up on shop shelves.”

“We’ve discovered that we can detect differences in the crystallisation of cocoa butter with ultrasonic waves,” said Prof. Koen Van Den Abeele from the KU Leuven Department of Physics and Astronomy. “The new technique involves sending transversal ultrasonic waves through the cocoa butter. The researchers then measure the reflection of these waves for information about the structure of the butter.”

“The technique is similar to the ultrasound echography used to monitor the health and growth of foetuses in the womb,” said Van Den Abeele. “When the cocoa butter is liquid, the ultrasonic wave is reflected in its entirety. As soon as the butter crystallises, part of the sound wave penetrates the cocoa butter, so the amount of reflection we measure changes. This enables us to see how the different crystals stick together, which is important for the ultimate properties of the chocolate.”

Chocolate manufacturers currently check the quality of their chocolate “offline.” A sample is taken from the production line to be analysed in a lab. This method is time-consuming, making it impossible to intervene quickly when something is wrong. As a result, a large amount of chocolate is destroyed or re-processed, which is a costly affair. The novel technique can be used “online” to check the chocolate while it is still on the production line.

The researchers designed a lab prototype, which now needs to be turned into a prototype for use in real chocolate production lines. The current results were obtained with cocoa butter and need to be confirmed for actual chocolate.

The findings are the result of Annelien Rigolle’s interdisciplinary doctoral research, supervised by Foubert, who specialises in fat crystallisation, and Van Den Abeele, who’s an expert in the use of ultrasound for non-destructive testing of materials such as composites, metals and concrete.

KU Leuven
www.kuleuven.be

Related Articles Read More >

Lazurite ArthroFree wireless surgical camera system Minnetronix Medical
How Minnetronix Medical helped Lazurite with its wireless surgical camera
Galien Foundation 2022 nominees
18 of the world’s most innovative medical technologies
A smiling portrait of AWS Chief Medical Officer Taha Kass-Hout
Amazon Web Services is powering medtech innovation: Its chief medical officer explains
An x-ray showing pneumothorax
Aidoc’s AI-powered X-ray system cleared to detect collapsed lungs

DeviceTalks Weekly.

May 20, 2022
DeviceTalks Boston Post-Game – Editors’ Top Moments, Insulet’s Eric Benjamin on future of Omnipod 5
See More >

MDO Digital Edition

Digital Edition

Subscribe to Medical Design & Outsourcing. Bookmark, share and interact with the leading medical design engineering magazine today.

MEDTECH 100 INDEX

Medtech 100 logo
Market Summary > Current Price
The MedTech 100 is a financial index calculated using the BIG100 companies covered in Medical Design and Outsourcing.
DeviceTalks

DeviceTalks is a conversation among medical technology leaders. It's events, podcasts, webinars and one-on-one exchanges of ideas & insights.

DeviceTalks

New MedTech Resource

Medical Tubing

Enewsletter Subscriptions

Enewsletter Subscriptions

MassDevice

Mass Device

The Medical Device Business Journal. MassDevice is the leading medical device news business journal telling the stories of the devices that save lives.

Visit Website
MDO ad
Medical Design and Outsourcing
  • MassDevice
  • DeviceTalks
  • MedTech 100 Index
  • Medical Tubing + Extrusion
  • Drug Delivery Business News
  • Drug Discovery & Development
  • Pharmaceutical Processing World
  • R&D World
  • About Us/Contact
  • Advertise With Us
  • Subscribe to Print Magazine
  • Subscribe to E-newsletter
  • Attend our Monthly Webinars
  • Listen to our Weekly Podcasts
  • Join our DeviceTalks Tuesdays Discussion

Copyright © 2022 WTWH Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Site Map | Privacy Policy | RSS

Search Medical Design & Outsourcing

  • Home
  • Medical Device Business
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Financial
    • Regulatory
  • Applications
    • Cardiovascular
    • Devices
    • Imaging
    • Implantables
    • Medical Equipment
    • Orthopedic
    • Surgical
  • Technologies
    • Contract Manufacturing
    • Components
    • Electronics
    • Extrusions
    • Materials
    • Motion Control
    • Prototyping
    • Pumps
    • Tubing
  • Med Tech Resources
    • DeviceTalks Tuesdays
    • Digital Editions
    • eBooks
    • Manufacturer Search
    • Medical Device Handbook
    • MedTech 100 Index
    • Podcasts
    • Print Subscription
    • The Big 100
    • Webinars / Digital Events
    • Whitepapers
    • Video
  • 2022 Leadership in MedTech
    • 2022 Leadership Voting!
    • 2021 Winners
    • 2020 Winners
  • Women in Medtech