1.

Description of Microwave

Microwaving a quicker warming and cooking than a conventional

range oven. It's popular way to safely defrost meats. It provides another source
of cooking to supplement or for certain foods.
While most microwaves use only this type of cooking/heating
technology, there are models that have dual functions - microwaving
and convection cooking. And a microwave cooking function can also be found in
portable or wall ovens with multiple cooking technologies. So this type of cooking
can be found in combination with other cooking equipment.
Microwaves are the most economical of (large) kitchen appliances it
tends to fall in this category of household appliances.
These small ovens are including portable units that can be placed on a
counter, shelf or microwave stand, are custom installed within cabinetry and
above-the-range microwaves that combine an exhaust fan with lighting.
There are also multifunction units such as a coffee maker or toaster.
Microwave prices vary based on heating/cooking functions, preset settings,
capacity and installation style. They are available mostly in white, stainless or
black finish.
When it comes to cooking and baking in a microwave oven, you can
cook most foods in a microwave oven such as baked desserts, for many recipes
and dishes melting butter, popping corn, heating a beverage or water to boiling
temperature, defrosting and reheating. Over cooking can render very dry vittles
as . Yet many would not part with their microwave and find they use it often
enough to justify the purchase. Steel, metal/tin, stainless, items with gold rims
such as china tea cups and foil wrap - just to name a few, most generic plastic
containers can melt or deform if placed in a microwave for an extended cooking
period on high heat cannot be used in a microwave.Styrofoam containers such as
those from restaurant take-outs, cannot be reheated in a microwave. There are

very handy plastic items though such as plate covers, popcorn bowls and bacon
dishes that are very convenient to have for microwaving.
Microwave sources

High-power microwave sources use specialized vacuum tubes to

generate microwaves. These devices operate on different principles from lowfrequency vacuum tubes, using the ballistic motion of electrons in a vacuum
under the influence of controlling electric or magnetic fields, and include
the magnetron (used inmicrowave ovens), klystron, traveling-wave tube (TWT),
andgyrotron. These devices work in the density modulated mode, rather than
the current modulated mode. This means that they work on the basis of clumps
of electrons flying ballistically through them, rather than using a continuous
stream of electrons.
Low-power microwave sources use solid-state devices such as thefieldeffect transistor (at least at lower frequencies), tunnel diodes,Gunn diodes,
and IMPATT diodes.[3] Low-power sources are available as benchtop instruments,
rackmount instruments, embeddable modules and in card-level formats.
A maser is a solid state device which amplifies microwaves using similar
principles to the laser, which amplifies higher frequency light waves.
All warm objects emit low level microwave black-body radiation,
depending on their temperature, so in meteorology andremote
sensing microwave radiometers are used to measure the temperature of objects
or terrain.[4] The sun[5] and other astronomical radio sources such as Cassiopeia
A emit low level microwave radiation which carries information about their
makeup, which is studied by radio astronomers using receivers called radio
telescopes.[4] The cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR), for example,
is a weak microwave noise filling empty space which is a major source of
information on cosmology's Big Bang theory of the origin of the Universe
How Does a Microwave Work
The frozen burrito in your microwave oven sits in an electromagnetic
field, bombarded on all sides by high-frequency microwaves. Free water
molecules (along with some fats and sugars) absorb the microwaves, and the
resulting vibrations cause friction between molecules (i.e., heat).
Because not all the water in your burrito has frozen (due to the
presence of other chemicals, like salt), heat is generated in those pockets of free

molecules sooner than in frozen areas. That's why your burrito sometimes comes
out unevenly heated.
Why can't you wrap your meal in aluminum foil? Metal blocks the highenergy particles of the electromagnetic field, making for more trouble than a
melted candy bar.
Design
A microwave oven consists of:

high voltage power source, commonly a simple transformer or an

electronicpower converter, which passes energy to the magnetron

a high voltage capacitor connected to the magnetron, transformer

and via adiode to the chassis

a cavity magnetron, which converts high-voltage electric energy to

microwave radiation

a magnetron control circuit (usually with a microcontroller)

a short waveguide (to couple microwave power from the

magnetron into the cooking chamber)

a metal cooking chamber

a turntable or metal wave guide stirring fan.

a digital / manual control panel

Modern microwave ovens use either an analog dial-type timer or a

digital control panel for operation. Control panels feature an LED, liquid crystal or
vacuum fluorescent display, numeric buttons for entering the cook time, a power
level selection feature and other possible functions such as a defrost setting and
pre-programmed settings for different food types, such as meat, fish,
poultry, vegetables, frozen vegetables, frozen dinners, and popcorn. In most
ovens, the magnetron is driven by a linear
transformer which can only feasibly be
switched completely on or off. As such, the
choice of power level does not affect the
intensity of the microwave radiation; instead,
the magnetron is cycled on and off every few
seconds, thus altering the large scale duty
cycle. Newer models have inverter power
supplies that use pulse-width modulation to
provide effectively continuous heating at
reduced power, so that foods are heated more

evenly at a given power level and can be heated more quickly without being
damaged by uneven heating.
The microwave frequencies used in microwave ovens are chosen
based on regulatory and cost constraints. The first is that they should be in one
of the industrial, scientific, and medical (ISM) frequency bands set aside for noncommunication purposes. For household purposes, 2.45 GHz has the advantage
over 915 MHz in that 915 MHz is only an ISM band in theITU Region 2 while
2.45 GHz is available worldwide.[citation needed][vague] Three additional ISM bands exist
in the microwave frequencies, but are not used for microwave cooking. Two of
them are centered on 5.8 GHz and 24.125 GHz, but are not used for microwave
cooking because of the very high cost of power generation at these frequencies.
The third, centered on 433.92 MHz, is a narrow band that would require
expensive equipment to generate sufficient power without creating interference
outside the band, and is only available in some countries.
The cooking chamber is similar to a Faraday cage (but there is no
continuous metal-to-metal contact around the rim of the door), and prevents the
waves from coming out of the oven. The oven door usually has a window for easy
viewing, with a layer of conductive mesh some distance from the outer panel to
maintain the shielding. Because the size of the perforations in the mesh is much
less than the microwaves' wavelength (12.2 cm for the usual 2.45 GHz), most of
the microwave radiation cannot pass through the door, while visible light (with its
much shorter wavelength) can.