Migration of components from plastics-packaging materials into packed goods — test methods and diffusion models

Food/Package Compatibility and Migration

“…If a packaging material also experiences swelling through the components of the foods, then the mass transfer accelerates with the progression of the swelling. This phenomenon was studied by the UFG-Group in Hamburg [10], which took fat-releasing food as an example. The following example from our organization shows that even substances which are difficult to volatilize are able to permeate if good contact is possible.…”

“…For example, with PVC the residual vinyl chloride (VC) monomer was usually about 1 % prior to 1974 but it has now been reduced to < 1 ppm required for PVC in contact with food [9]. The proposed FDA regulation for PVC requires not more than 1 ppm VC be contained in PVC and the migration to food is to be limited to 10 ppb, which is equivalent to the present detection limit using the most sensitive method, i.e., mass spectrometer detection. The state of the art allows polymers to be produced which should meet requirements in respect to migration of these residual monomers.…”

Structure and Cohesive Energy Density of Fats and Their Sorption by Polymer Films

“…Published reports are few on foodpolymer interactions and very little has applied to sorption of fats by plastics. Figge (1980) studied fat sorption from solid and liquid dairy products in direct contact with polyethylene films and found a wide range of sorption dependent on physical structure of the foodstuffs. From fat-containing foods which were essentially lypophillic greater amounts of fat were sorbed into plastic packaging materials while from those with fat phases shielded by water or protein barriers less fat was sorbed.…”

Migration and blooming of stabilizing antioxidants in polypropylene

“…he loss of stabilizing additives via evaporation, T surface blooming, or extraction into neighboring fluids is a n obvious factor in their performance. It is also a factor to be considered in, for example, designing additives for polymers in food contact applications (1). Many additives are used at levels above their intrinsic solubility in polymer, and are therefore held in a supersaturated solution either by virtue of the fact that their diffusion constants are low and loss is thereby minimized, or that a binary system is formed after a n additive is compounded into polymer which consists of a saturated solution of additive in polymer plus a separate additive phase.…”