Book excerpt: This book consists of peer-reviewed articles reporting on the latest developments in several food engineering and agricultural processing laboratories at US land-granted universities. The contributors are leading experts in their respective fields.The topics covered in the book include new food processing technologies (such as high voltage electric field processing and microwave sterilization/pasteurization), conversion of agricultural by-products into high quality refined cellulose or biodegradable plastics, and advances in machine vision inspection and sorting techniques for fruit and vegetable packaging lines. Each chapter begins with a general background review with important references, and ends with the latest results from each research laboratory.