{"id":92401,"date":"2021-07-16T07:20:00","date_gmt":"2021-07-16T05:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/?p=92401"},"modified":"2021-07-12T14:12:15","modified_gmt":"2021-07-12T12:12:15","slug":"winning-the-battle-of-strawberry-preservation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/winning-the-battle-of-strawberry-preservation\/","title":{"rendered":"Winning the battle of strawberry preservation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

<\/h2>\n\n\n\n\n\n
\"A
Commercial strawberry containers generally use blotting paper.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Qu\u00e9bec produces more strawberries than any other Canadian province. Strawberries are delicate and difficult to keep fresh. In response to this challenge, Monique Lacroix<\/a>, a professor at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS), and her team have developed a packaging film that can keep strawberries fresh for up to 12 days. The team\u2019s  findings<\/a> on how this film protects against mould and certain pathogenic bacteria have been published in Food Hydrocolloids<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The innovative film is made of chitosan, a natural molecule found in shellfish shells. This food industry by-product contains key antifungal properties that curb mould growth. The packaging film also contains essential oils and nanoparticles, both of which possess antimicrobial properties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEssential oil vapours protect strawberries. And if the film comes into contact with strawberries, the chitosan and nanoparticles prevent mould and pathogens from reaching the fruit\u2019s surface.\u201d<\/p>Monique Lacroix, expert in sciences, applied to food<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Among other things, the packaging could be inserted into blotting paper the industry currently uses for strawberries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Versatile protection<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The formula developed for this packaging film has the added advantage of being effective against several types of pathogens. The team tested the film on four microbial cultures. \u201cOur work has shown the film\u2019s effectiveness against Aspergillus niger<\/em>, a highly resistant mould that causes substantial losses during strawberry production,\u201d said Lacroix.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This type of bioactive packaging also showed antimicrobial efficacy against the pathogens Escherichia coli<\/em>, Listeria monocytogenes<\/em>, and Salmonella Typhimurium<\/em>, which come from contamination during food handling and are a major source of concern for the food industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Benefits of irradiation<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Professor Lacroix and her team also combined the packaging film with an irradiation process. When packaging film was exposed to radiation, team members noted longer shelf life, cutting the level of loss in half compared to the control (without film or irradiation).  On day 12, the team recorded a 55% loss rate for the control group of strawberries, 38% for the group with the film, and 25% when irradiation was added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Irradiation not only extended shelf life, it also helped preserve or increased the quantity of polyphenols in the strawberries. These molecules give strawberries their colour and have antioxidant properties. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


About the study<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The article \u201cEffect of chitosan\/essential oils\/silver nanoparticles composite films packaging and gamma irradiation on shelf life of strawberries<\/a>\u201d by Shiv Shankar, Diako Khodaei, and Monique Lacroix was published in Food Hydrocolloids<\/em>. The study received funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada<\/a> (NSERC) and the International Atomic Energy Agency<\/a> (IAEA).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Qu\u00e9bec produces more strawberries than any other Canadian province. Strawberries are delicate and difficult to keep fresh. In response to this challenge, Monique Lacroix, a professor at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS), and her team have developed a packaging film that can keep strawberries fresh for up to 12 days. The team\u2019s  findings on how […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","nova_meta_subtitle":"Films made of shellfish shells, essential oils, and nanoparticles protect fruit from microbes","footnotes":""},"categories":[5572],"tags":[5838,5847,13661,7105],"supplier":[16834],"class_list":["post-92401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bio-based","tag-bioeconomy","tag-bioplastics","tag-films","tag-packaging","supplier-institut-national-de-la-recherche-scientifique-inrs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92401"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92401\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92401"},{"taxonomy":"supplier","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/supplier?post=92401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}