MICROSOFT EXCEL LETHAL RATE CALCULATORS AND TEMPERATURE TIME INTEGRATORS FOR THERMAL PROCESSES
Introduction
This section provides the context to using Excel to calculate the cumulative lethal effects (at all stages during processing) of heat on microorganisms and provides an explanation of how the Excel spreadsheets and On Line calculators available for download from the Dairy Science and Food Technology (DSFT) work.
Here we provide an overview of the background, including a summary of the underlying mathematics, required to produce an Excel spreadsheet for performing basic thermal processing calculations. Note I am not providing a guide to using spreadsheets but basic information that a competent Excel user should be able to use to make their own thermal processing spreadsheet.