Jose Ashitha, Anitha Sasidharan Saranya, Chacko Chinnu, Mukkumkal Jacob Dhanya, Edayileveettil Krishnankutty Radhakrishnan
School of Biosciences, Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam, India, 686 560.
St Thomas College, Pala, Kottayam, India, 686 574.
Appl Biochem Biotechnol. 2022 Apr;194(4):1442-1457. doi: 10.1007/s12010-021-03709-3. Epub 2021 Nov 5.
The loss of fresh produces owing to the microbial infestation is a major challenge to the global food industry. The drastic food loss caused mainly by the fungal attack demands the need for development of active packaging materials with antimicrobial properties. Many studies have already been reported on the applications of polymers like polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) engineered with antimicrobial components as active antifungal packaging materials. In the current study, material properties of PVA alone, PVA incorporated with chitosan nanoparticles (PCS), clove oil (PCO), and their combination (PCSCO) have been studied for its microbial barrier and antifungal properties. All the developed films were characterised by the XRD and FTIR analysis, which confirmed the molecular interactions among the individual components of the nanocomposite. At the same time, the bionanocomposite PCSCO was found to have low moisture content and film solubility indicating its suitability for the modified atmosphere packaging applications. In addition, the presence of chitosan nanoparticles and clove oil was found to provide the microbial barrier properties to the PCS, PCO, and PCSCO films. The PCSCO film was further demonstrated to have superior antifungal activity against the selected Pythium aphanidermatum. The results of the study indicate the potential application of developed nanocomposite film as a promising antifungal packaging material.
由于微生物侵染导致新鲜农产品损失是全球食品行业面临的一项重大挑战。主要由真菌侵袭造成的严重食品损失，使得开发具有抗菌性能的活性包装材料成为必要。许多关于以抗菌成分改性的聚合物（如聚乙烯醇（PVA））作为活性抗真菌包装材料应用的研究已有报道。在当前研究中，对单独的PVA、掺入壳聚糖纳米颗粒的PVA（PCS）、丁香油的PVA（PCO）及其组合（PCSCO）的材料性能进行了研究，以考察其微生物阻隔和抗真菌性能。所有制备的薄膜都通过XRD和FTIR分析进行了表征，证实了纳米复合材料各组分之间的分子相互作用。同时，发现生物纳米复合材料PCSCO具有低水分含量和薄膜溶解性，表明其适用于气调包装应用。此外，发现壳聚糖纳米颗粒和丁香油的存在为PCS、PCO和PCSCO薄膜提供了微生物阻隔性能。进一步证明，PCSCO薄膜对所选瓜果腐霉具有优异的抗真菌活性。研究结果表明，所开发的纳米复合薄膜作为一种有前景的抗真菌包装材料具有潜在的应用价值。
