Starch is a versatile and a widely used ingredient, with applications in many industries including adhesive and binding, paper making, corrugating, construction, paints and coatings, chemical, pharmaceutical, textiles, oilfield, food and feed. However, native starches present limited applications, which impairs their industrial use. Consequently, starch is commonly modified to achieve desired properties. Chemical treatments are the most exploited to bring new functionalities to starch. However, those treatments can be harmful to the environment and can also bring risks to the human health, limiting their applications. In this scenario, there is a search for techniques that are both environmentally friendly and efficient, bringing new desired functionalities to starches. Therefore, this review presents an up-to-date overview of the available literature data regarding the use of environmentally friendly treatments for starch modification. Among them, we highlighted an innovative chemical treatment (ozone) and different physical treatments, as the modern pulsed electric field (PEF), the emerging ultrasound (US) technology, and two other treatments based on heating (dry heating treatment – DHT, and heat moisture treatment – HMT). It was observed that these environmentally friendly technologies have potential to be used for starch modification, since they create materials with desirable functionalities with the advantage of being categorized as clean label ingredients.

Ice nucleation is a stochastic process and it is very difficult to be controlled. Freezing technologies and more specifically crystallisation assisted by magnetic, electric and electromagnetic fields have the capability to interact with nucleation. Static magnetic field (SMF) may affect matter crystallisation; however, this is still under debate in the literature. Static electric field (SEF) has a significant effect on crystallisation; this has been evidenced experimentally and confirmed by the theory. Oscillating magnetic field induces an oscillating electric field and is also expected to interact with water crystallisation. Oscillating electromagnetic fields interact with water, perturb and even disrupt hydrogen bonds, which in turn are thought to increase the degree of supercooling and to generate numerous fine ice crystals. Based on the literature, it seems that the frequency has an influence on the above-mentioned phenomena. This review article summarizes the fundamentals of freezing under magnetic, electric and electromagnetic fields, as well as their applicability and potentials within the food industry.