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Recent Trends in the Application of Sustainable Edible Coatings to Active Food Packaging

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A special issue of Foods (ISSN 2304-8158). This special issue belongs to the section "Food Engineering and Technology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 November 2020) | Viewed by 37007

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Special Issue Editor

Dr. Arantzazu Valdés García

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Guest Editor

Analytical Chemistry, Nutrition & Food Sciences Department, University of Alicante, P.O. Box 99, 03080 Alicante, Spain
Interests: food quality; food safety; materials chemistry; spectroscopy; analytical chemistry; food technology; food packaging materials; food processing
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The production of fresh and minimally processed foods has increased exponentially because of the current increase in consumer demand for natural foods. However, each year, an estimated 1.3 billion tons—worth around $1 trillion—ends up rotting in the bins of consumers and retailers, or spoiling due to poor transportation and harvesting practices. As a result, the food industry has been exploring innovative materials and technologies to improve fresh and minimally processed food products’ market impact and reduce food waste. Edible coatings based on different natural materials, such as proteins, lipids, polysaccharides, or combinations of these, offer freshness, quality, and food safety, being an environmentally friendly technology.

For the present Special Issue, entitled “Recent Trends in the Application of Sustainable Edible Coatings to Food Packaging", we invite both original research and review articles related to the current state-of-the-art in edible active matrices with an emphasis on recent trends in reducing food wastes and novel processing technologies. This Special Issue will focus primarily on the following topics:

novel coating techniques;
polysaccharide-based edible coatings;
protein-based edible coatings;
lipid-based edible coatings;
novel natural additives;
different food packaging applications (meat, fish, fruits, vegetables, etc.);
shelf life analysis;
active packaging; and
food wastes.

Prof. Arantzazu Valdés García
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Foods is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

edible coatings
food packaging
food quality
polysaccharides
proteins
lipids
active packaging
bioactive compounds
food wastes
biopolymers

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

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20 pages, 2077 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Impact of Olive Extract Addition on Corn Starch-Based Active Edible Films Properties for Food Packaging Applications

by Arantzazu Valdés García, Olga B. Álvarez-Pérez, Romeo Rojas, Cristobal N. Aguilar and María Carmen Garrigós

Foods 2020, 9(9), 1339; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/foods9091339 - 22 Sep 2020

Cited by 24 | Viewed by 5305

Abstract

Active edible films based on corn starch containing glycerol as a plasticizer and an olive extract obtained from Spanish olive fruit (Olea europaea) by-products (olive extract; OE) at different concentrations (0, 0.05, 0.1 and 0.2 wt%) were prepared by using the casting technique and further solvent-evaporation. OE showed high total phenolic and flavonoids contents and antioxidant activity, which was evaluated by using three different methods: free radical scavenging assay by (1,1-dipheny l-2-picrylhydrazyl) DPPH, 2,2-azino-bis (3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) ABTS radical inhibition and ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP). The incorporation of OE into the corn starch/glycerol matrix underlined the antioxidant potential and antimicrobial effect against E. coli and S. aureus of these novel active films, being noticeable for films added with 0.2 wt% OE. The developed active films showed a clear thermo-oxidative stability improvement with OE incorporation, in particular at 0.2 wt% loading with an increase of around 50 °C in the initial degradation temperature (T_ini) and oxidation onset temperature (OOT). The functional properties of control films were also improved with OE addition resulting in a decrease in Young’s modulus, elongation at break, shore D hardness and water vapor permeability. The present work suggested the potential of the developed corn starch-based edible films as low-price and sustainable food packaging systems to prevent the oxidative deterioration of packaged foodstuff while reducing also the generation of olive by-products. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Trends in the Application of Sustainable Edible Coatings to Active Food Packaging)

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Graphical abstract

12 pages, 2768 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Candelilla Wax Edible Coating with Flourensia cernua Bioactives to Prolong the Quality of Tomato Fruits

by Judith Ruiz-Martínez, Jorge A. Aguirre-Joya, Romeo Rojas, Antonio Vicente, Miguel A. Aguilar-González, Raúl Rodríguez-Herrera, Olga B. Alvarez-Perez, Cristian Torres-León and Cristóbal N. Aguilar

Foods 2020, 9(9), 1303; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/foods9091303 - 16 Sep 2020

Cited by 31 | Viewed by 5036

Abstract

The improvement of the postharvest quality of tomato fruits was evaluated using an edible coating functionalized with an Flourensia cernua extract evaluating the antifungal, structural, barrier, and optical properties. The formulation and evaluation of an edible coating and its application on tomato was evaluated using a response surface methodology to determine the ideal concentrations of candelilla wax, whey protein, and glycerol. Edible films showed good barrier properties, with water vapor permeability varying from 0.435–0.404 g mm/m² day kPa. The addition o F. cernua extract showed significant improvement in the transparency of films. The edible coating applied to tomato reduced weight and firmness loss. The sensory evaluation proved that the product obtained is acceptable for consumers. The edible coating added with F. cernua extract was the most effective in inhibiting the growth of pathogenic fungi and the visual appearance at the end of storage confirmed the beneficial effect of the edible coating. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Trends in the Application of Sustainable Edible Coatings to Active Food Packaging)

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Graphical abstract

18 pages, 2230 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Physicochemical and Functional Properties of Active Fish Gelatin-Based Edible Films Added with Aloe Vera Gel

by Jorge Trujillo Sánchez, Arantzazu Valdés García, Antonio Martínez-Abad, Francisco Vilaplana, Alfonso Jiménez and María Carmen Garrigós

Foods 2020, 9(9), 1248; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/foods9091248 - 07 Sep 2020

Cited by 21 | Viewed by 3606

Abstract

Edible films based on the addition of Aloe Vera gel (AV) into fish gelatin (FG) with antimicrobial and functional properties for food packaging applications were proposed in this work. AV showed an amphiphilic nature by infrared spectroscopy, high total phenolics content (TPC), antioxidant activity and thermal stability with an initial degradation temperature of 174 ± 2 °C. Mannose and glucose were quantified as main monosaccharides whereas the linkage composition study confirmed the presence of acemannan as main active polysaccharide. Three different formulations were obtained by the casting technique and the addition of AV contents of 0, 1 and 4 wt.% to FG, showing films with 4 wt.% of AV the best performance. The addition of AV did not significantly affect mechanical and barrier properties to oxygen and water vapour. However, some structural changes were observed by infrared spectroscopy and the obtained glass transition temperature values due to intermolecular interactions that increased the hydrophilicity and solubility of the resulting FG/AV films. A higher thermal stability was observed in films with AV content increasing the initial degradation and oxidation onset temperatures. An antimicrobial activity against S. aureus was also observed for FG/AV films. The addition of AV into FG could be proposed as a potential effective material to increase the postharvest quality of packed fruits and vegetables by retarding the microbial growth and extending the shelf-life of these food products. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Trends in the Application of Sustainable Edible Coatings to Active Food Packaging)

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Graphical abstract

16 pages, 3959 KiB

Open AccessEditor’s ChoiceArticle

Preparation and Characterization of Coating Based on Protein Nanofibers and Polyphenol and Application for Salted Duck Egg Yolks

by Qiannan Wang, Weihua Liu, Bo Tian, Dongmei Li, Chunhong Liu, Bin Jiang and Zhibiao Feng

Foods 2020, 9(4), 449; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/foods9040449 - 07 Apr 2020

Cited by 63 | Viewed by 4775

Abstract

Salted duck egg yolk (SDEY) is one of the traditional pickled egg products in Asian countries, which suffers from the weight loss and deterioration of texture characteristics during storage. To better maintain the texture of SDEY, an edible coating based on whey protein isolate nanofibers (WPNFs) with glycerol (Gly) as a plasticizer and incorporating carvacrol (CA) as an antimicrobial agent was developed. Whey protein isolate (WPI, 5%) was used to self-assemble into WPNFs at 80 °C for 10 h. The particle size, zeta-potential and microstructure of WPNFs–CA emulsion were investigated to evaluate the distribution. Results proved that WPNFs–CA emulsion had smaller particle size and better distribution than WPI–CA emulsion. WPNFs–CA/Gly edible coating was then prepared based on WPNFs–CA emulsion. The WPNFs–CA/Gly edible coating exhibited higher antibacterial activity while the WPNFs–CA/Gly film had smooth and continuous surfaces and better transmittance compared with other samples. Furthermore, weight losses and textural properties changes of SDEYs with WPNFs–CA/Gly coating were evaluated. Results proved that salted duck egg yolks with WPNFs–CA/Gly coating exhibited lower weight losses. Textural properties were significantly improved by the WPNFs–CA/Gly coating on SDEYs than those uncoated samples. It was noted that the egg yolks coated with the WPNFs–CA/Gly coating had the lowest hardness increase rate (18.22%). Hence, WPNF-based coatings may have a good development prospect in the food industry. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Trends in the Application of Sustainable Edible Coatings to Active Food Packaging)

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Review

Jump to: Research

26 pages, 2244 KiB

Open AccessEditor’s ChoiceReview

Edible Films and Coatings as Food-Quality Preservers: An Overview

by Elsa Díaz-Montes and Roberto Castro-Muñoz

Foods 2021, 10(2), 249; https://doi.org/10.3390/foods10020249 - 26 Jan 2021

Cited by 187 | Viewed by 17260

Abstract

Food preservation technologies are currently facing important challenges at extending the shelf-life of perishable food products (e.g., meat, fish, milk, eggs, and many raw fruits and vegetables) that help to meet the daily nutrient requirement demand. In addition, food preservation has gone beyond only preservation; the current techniques are focused on the fulfillment of two additional objectives, the suitability of the used processes and generation of environmentally friendly products with non-presence of any side effect on health. Moreover, they are also looking for additional nutritional properties. One of these preservation protocols deals with the use of edible films and coatings. Therefore, this review shows an overview of synthetic materials (e.g., glass, aluminum, plastic, and paperboard), as well as the regulations that limit their application in food packaging. Further, this review releases the current-state-of-the-art of the use of films and edible coatings as an alternative to conventional packaging, providing the main features that these biodegradable packaging should meet towards specific uses for the conservation and improvement of various food products. Herein, particular attention has been paid to the main used components (e.g., biopolymers, additives, bioactive, and probiotic components), manufacturing methods (for edible films or coatings) and their application to specific products. In addition, an outlook of the application of edible films and coatings as quality indicators of perishable products is shown. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Trends in the Application of Sustainable Edible Coatings to Active Food Packaging)

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