Water Activity Levels

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What Are Water Activity Levels?
Many things affect how long a type of food can last before it spoils (shelf life). Water activity (aw) is used to express the amount of water available for microbes, enzymes, and chemical reactions inside food. The range of water activity is from 0.0 aw (very dry) to 1.0 aw (pure water). 1.0 aw is considered a high water activity level, while 0.0 aw is considered a low water activity level.

How Do You Store Food Safely?
There are many ways to store food safely. Let’s say you’re going on a backpacking trip and have the options of pre-cooked hamburgers, fresh strawberries, peanut butter, crackers, and raisins. What foods should you leave behind because of bacterial growth and which foods can you take? Foods with higher water activity levels are likely to last shorter because they will have microorganisms living inside. Some microorganisms are microbes and enzymes. To prevent microorganisms from living inside, foods with higher water activity levels than 0.85 aw, potentially hazardous foods, must be kept refrigerated to prevent bacteria growth, like fresh fruit of raw meat. Potentially hazardous foods are foods that can cause illness if their bacterial growth isn’t put to an end. …show more content…

If there are no water molecules to create that other microbe, the microbes will die out. Enzymes (a substance produced by a living organism that is there to bring out a specific reaction) and chemical reactions (a process that ) also need water. If the water activity level is lower than 0.6 aw, then the microorganisms stop growing. Some ways to preserve food, like drying corn, or salting meat work because they control the amount of water activity. Preserving food can evaporate the water (drying) or bind the water up (salting). By evaporating the water, the microorganisms can’t survive. Evaporation and binding water with other substances can both decrease the water activity level of a type of

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