Low-Density Polyethylene-Based Novel Active Packaging Film for Food Shelf-Life Extension via Thyme-Oil Control Release from SBA-15 Nanocarrier

Abstract

The use of natural raw substances for food preservation could provide a great contribution to food waste reduction, circular economy enhancement, and green process application widening. Recent studies indicated that the use of porous materials as adsorbents for natural essential oils provided nanohybrids with excellent antioxidant and antimicrobial properties. Following this trend in this work, a thymol oil (TEO) rich SBA-15 nanohybrid was prepared and characterized physiochemically with various techniques. This TEO@SBA-15 nanohybrid, along with the pure SBA-15, was extruded with low-density polyethylene (LDPE) to develop novel active packaging films. Results indicated that TEO loading was higher than other porous materials reported recently, and the addition of both pure SBA-15 and TEO@SBA-15 to the LDPE increased the water/oxygen barrier. The film with the higher thyme-oil@SBA-15 nanohybrid content exhibited a slower release kinetic. The antioxidant activity of the final films ignited after 48 h, was in the range of 60–70%, and was almost constant for 7 days. Finally, all tests indicated a sufficient improvement by the addition of thyme-oil@SBA-15 nanohybrids in the pure LDPE matrix and the concentration of wt. 10% of such nanocarriers provided the optimum final LDPE/10TEO@SBE-15 active packaging film. This material could be a potential future product for active packaging applications.

Development of Carvacrol@natural Zeolite Nanohybrid and Poly-Lactide Acid / Triethyl Citrate / Carvacrol@natural Zeolite Self-Healable Active Packaging Films for Minced Pork Shelf-Life Extension

“…The experimental procedure followed was based on the agar diffusion method described recently [43]. Briefly, a concentration of approx.…”

“…For the estimation of total viable count (TVC) for all samples of minced pork during the 10 days of storage a recently described methodology was followed [43]. Briefly, 10 g of pork fillets was aseptically removed from each packaging system and homogenized with 90 mL of sterile buffered peptone water (ΒPW, NCM0015A, Heywood, BL97JJ, UK) at room temperature.…”