Louis Pasteur invented pasteurization in the 1860s while investigating how to prevent wine and beer from souring by heating them to kill microbes.
Key details
- Pasteur developed the heat-treatment method after showing that unwanted microorganisms caused spoilage in beverages, and that heating to specific temperatures could prevent it without altering the product’s phase.
- Early successful demonstrations occurred in 1862, and the process was soon applied beyond wine to beer and eventually milk and other foods.
- The technique bears Pasteur’s name because his fermentation studies linked microbes to spoilage and led directly to this controlled heating process, reinforcing germ theory in the process.
