Examining for possible non-thermal effects during heating in a microwave oven

The assumption that the thermal effect (heating) is the sole factor that should be considered when a microwave source is applied has been debated by many reports, often claiming that athermal (non-thermal) effects exist as well. Such effects are claimed to change the chemical, biochemical, or the physical behaviour of some systems while the temperature and all other parameters remain unaltered. The possibility of an athermal effect was tested in a number of chemical, biological and physical systems in a very well controlled, high radiation intensity system (2.45 GHz, up to 1000 W/kg, with continuous radiation up to 48 h). The systems that were tested included: Maillard reaction, protein denaturation and polymer solubility, mutagenesis of bacteria, mutarotation equilibrium of α/β-d-glucose, and saturation solubility of NaCl. All data failed to show any significant athermal effects. The results of this study are in contrast to what has been previously reported for some of the tested systems.