title: Ultrasonic monitoring of fish thawing process optimal time of thawing and effect of freezing/thawing.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Fish quality is traditionally controlled by chemical and microbiological analysis. The non-destructive control presents an enormous professional interest thanks to the technical contribution and precision of the analysis to which it leads. This paper presents the results obtained from a characterisation of fish thaw-ing process by the ultrasonic technique, with monitoring thermal processing from frozen to defrosted states.
  
  
  METHODS
  The study was carried out on fish type red drum and salmon cut into fillets of 15 mm thickness. After being frozen at -20°C, the sample is enclosed in a plexiglas vessel with parallel walls at the ambient temperature 30°C and excited in perpendicular incidence at 0.5 MHz by an ultrasonic pulser-receiver Sofranel 5052PR. the technique of measurement consists to study the signals reflected by fish during its thawing, the specific techniques of signal processing are implemented to deduce informations characterizing the state of fish and its thawing process by examining the evolution of the position echoes reflected by the sample and the viscoelastic parameters of fish during its thawing.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The obtained results show a relationship between the thermal state of fish and its acoustic properties, which allowed to deduce the optimal time of the first thawing in order to restrict the growth of microbial flora. For salmon, the results show a decrease of 36% of the time of the second thawing and an increase of 10.88% of the phase velocity, with a decrease of 65.5% of the peak-to-peak voltage of the signal reflected, thus a decrease of the acoustic impedance.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This study shows an optimal time and an evolution rate of thawing specific to each type offish and a correlation between the acoustic behavior of fish and its thermal state which approves that this technique of ultrasonic monitoring can substitute the control using the destructive chemical analysis in order to monitor the thawing process and to know whether a fish has suffered an accidental thawing.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Metrology and Data Processing, Ibn Zohr University,Agadir, Morocco.
authors.forename: Youssef Ait
authors.initials: YA
authors.lastname: El Kadi
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Metrology and Data Processing, Ibn Zohr University,Agadir, Morocco.
authors.forename: Ali
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Moudden
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Metrology and Data Processing, Ibn Zohr University,Agadir, Morocco.
authors.forename: Bouazza
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Faiz
authors.affiliation: Ultrasonic Laboratory of Acoustics and Electronics, University of Le Havre, France.
authors.forename: Gerard
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Maze
authors.affiliation: Ultrasonic Laboratory of Acoustics and Electronics, University of Le Havre, France.
authors.forename: Dominique
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Decultot
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005615:Freezing; D012474:Salmon / Q000502:physiology*; D017747:Seafood / Q000032:analysis*; D013997:Time Factors; D044366:Transition Temperature; D014463:Ultrasonography / Q000379:methods