Table 2.

Operation conditions of different sterilization techniques.

Category	Technique	Temperature (°C)	Pressure (MPa)	Concentration	pH	Contact time	Other comments
Heat	Steam	125–130	0.2–0.3			10–30 min	Pre-heating to the desired sterilization temperature
	Dry heat	160				120 min
Irradiation	Gamma					Hours	Dosage, 10–30 kGy
	E-beam					Minutes	Dosage, 25–150 kGy
	UV					2 h	Wavelength (200–280 nm)
Plasma	Plasma	25–70	Varies			0.5–1 h	Gas composition
Chemical sterilization	EtO	30–65	0.1–0.5	400–1200 mg/L		3–6 h	Relative humidity (40%–80%)
	PAA	20–60		800–3000 mg/L	Acidic	Minutes to hours	Relative humidity (20%–80%)
	Ethanol			60%–80%		Minutes9
	Iodine	10–4010		0.1%–1%	3–910	Minutes11
Novel techniques	sCO2	30–60	7.38–20.5		Acidic	0.5–4 h
	Antibiotics					Hours12
	Freeze-drying	−50 to 80				Hours13

UV: ultraviolet; EtO: ethylene oxide; PAA: peracetic acid; sCO₂: supercritical carbon dioxide.