Investigating the Influence of Aging on Radiofrequency Dielectric Properties of Chicken Meat

Changes in quality attributes of aging chicken meat were tracked through measurement of the dielectric properties with an open-ended coaxial probe between 200 MHz and 20 GHz at 23 degrees C. The chicken meat was stored in a refrigerator for 8 days at 4 degrees C. Changes in dielectric constant and loss factor were measured daily over an 8-day span study. The dielectric constant decreased with frequency and storage duration with a slope change at about 4 GHz. The frequency dependence of the dielectric loss factor was dominated by the ionic conduction in the lower frequency range and dipolar relaxation of water above 3 GHz. The dielectric loss factor increased with storage duration for frequencies below 3 GHz and remained almost constant above that frequency. A Cole-Cole model revealed that the ionic conductivity, sigma, and relaxation time spread, alpha, increased with storage time, while the relaxation time, tau, remained almost constant.