Background The growing environmental concern of plastic packaging disposal has led to the innovation of biodegradable biopolymers. Consumer demand and health concern further necessitate the emergence of active and intelligent packaging system to monitor the quality of packed food. Whereas, the use of chemical dyes as an indicator in smart packaging is not suitable for food packaging because of their high toxicity and harmful effects on human health and the environment. Hence, the researchers are focused on natural pigments derived from plants and food waste as indicating substance in biodegradable packaging and also for the valorization of food waste. Scope and approach This paper summarizes the research on the utilization of naturally derived food- and food waste-based pigments (anthocyanins, curcumin, betalains, carotenoids, chlorophyll, brazilin, quercetin, etc.) with biopolymeric matrices (starch, cellulose, chitin, gums, agar, etc.) to fabricate “smart biodegradable films”, for effective monitoring of spoilage and quality of meat products, seafood, milk, and others. Key Findings and Conclusions The results show that the smart packaging material developed by the biopolymers with plant-based pigment has the potential to replace the traditional plastic packaging materials. The extracted from food and food waste act as an indicator in smart packaging and promotes the valorization of food waste. The biodegradable packaging is economical, safe, non-toxic, sensitive, and natural pigments act as a quality indicator in packaging systems. Further, these packaging films can be optimized and commercialized and to be employed as active and intelligent packaging for visual quality evaluation of fresh food products.

Active and intelligent biodegradable packaging films using food and food waste-derived bioactive compounds: A review

https://biblio.ugent.be/publication/8702100/file/8703895.pdf

Modification approaches of plant-based proteins to improve their techno-functionality and use in food products

Environmental pollution problems caused by plastic-based packaging promote alternative sustainable solutions to be imminent. Chitosan and gelatin are attracting great attentions in food packaging applications and representing interesting biomaterials for developing edible packaging film due to their excellent inherent properties including degradability, edibility, film-forming property and compatible nature. With the development of technology and economy, food-grade chitosan and food-grade gelatin are emerging and produced under legislation or standards proposed by the government or organization. These chitosan and gelatin could form uniform film-forming solutions and fabricate edible films by strategies including casting, electrospinning and thermoplastic method. The emerging chitosan-gelatin composite films with excellent physical properties including mechanical property, surface hydrophobic property, color property, barrier property and thermal property have achieved great developments. This article comprehensively reviews recent advances in legislation of raw materials, fabrication strategies and physical properties of chitosan-gelatin based edible films.

Edible films from chitosan-gelatin: Physical properties and food packaging application

Wound healing activity of Chitosan/Polyvinyl Alcohol embedded by gold nanoparticles prepared by nanosecond laser ablation

Characterization of pH sensitive sago starch films enriched with anthocyanin-rich torch ginger extract

Development of antioxidant, antimicrobial and ammonia-sensitive films based on quaternary ammonium chitosan, polyvinyl alcohol and betalains-rich cactus pears (Opuntia ficus-indica) extract

Development of multifunctional food packaging by incorporating betalains from vegetable amaranth (Amaranthus tricolor L.) into quaternary ammonium chitosan/fish gelatin blend films.

Proteins and phenolic compounds are two types of food ingredients with distinct functionalities. In the past decade, many attempts have been made to conjugate phenolic compounds with proteins through covalent linkages. Four types of conjugation reactions including alkaline, free radical mediated grafting, enzyme catalyzed grafting and chemical coupling methods are frequently used to synthesize phenolic–protein conjugates. The synthesized phenolic–protein conjugates can be well characterized by several different instrumental methods, such as UV spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, fluorescence spectroscopy, circular dichroism, mass spectroscopy, sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and differential scanning calorimetry. Importantly, phenolic–protein conjugates exhibit improved biological properties (e.g. antioxidant, anticancer and antimicrobial activities) as compared with native proteins. Moreover, the applications of native proteins can be greatly widened by conjugation with phenolic compounds. Phenolic–protein conjugates have been developed as antioxidant emulsions for nutraceutical delivery, edible films for food packaging, stabilizers for metal nanoparticles, and hydrogels and nanoparticles for controlled drug release. In this review, recent advances in the synthesis, characterization, biological properties and potential applications of phenolic–protein conjugates were summarized.

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Xiyu Yao

Papers

Development of antioxidant, antimicrobial and ammonia-sensitive films based on quaternary ammonium chitosan, polyvinyl alcohol and betalains-rich cactus pears (Opuntia ficus-indica) extract

Development of multifunctional food packaging by incorporating betalains from vegetable amaranth (Amaranthus tricolor L.) into quaternary ammonium chitosan/fish gelatin blend films.

Recent advances in phenolic–protein conjugates: synthesis, characterization, biological activities and potential applications

Comparison of the physical and functional properties of starch/polyvinyl alcohol films containing anthocyanins and/or betacyanins

Development and comparison of different polysaccharide/PVA-based active/intelligent packaging films containing red pitaya betacyanins