Paper NM-WeM12
CNC Modification for the Development of Active Food Packaging

Wednesday, December 14, 2016, 11:40 am, Room Hau

Irradiation treatment of CNC was performed at doses of 5-20 kGy followed by reaction with a redox group of ascorbic acid (AA) and hydrogen peroxide in order to promote the formation of radicals on the macromolecule to enhanced the interaction of CNC with gallic acid. Our results have demonstrated that both of these pre-treatments induce the formation of carboxylic acid groups on CNC surface by conductometric titration. Derivates of carboxylic acid are known as food stabilizers and preservers due to their antiradical and antimicrobial effects. Since gallic acid has carboxilic acid groups, it was found that its interaction with pre-teated CNC with gamma-irradiation in the presence of redox group (CNC-g-GA) can impart to native CNC antiradical properties. A solution of 20% of CNC-g-GA was then added to a 1% (w/w) gellan in order to produced antiradical gellan-based film packaging. A significant improvement of the tensile strength (TS), the tensile modulus (TM) and the elongation at break (EB) and the water resistance was observed when CNC-g-GA was added to the film packaging formulation (p < 0.05). These results bring to a new application of antiradical film packaging or coatings which could be applied for food industry to preserve fruit and vegetables during storage.