Polysaccharide-Based Nanocomposites for Food Packaging Applications

Abstract

The article presents a review of the literature on the use of polysaccharide bionanocomposites in the context of their potential use as food packaging materials. Composites of this type consist of at least two phases, of which the outer phase is a polysaccharide, and the inner phase (dispersed phase) is an enhancing agent with a particle size of 1-100 nm in at least one dimension. The literature review was carried out using data from the Web of Science database using VosViewer, free software for scientometric analysis. Source analysis concluded that polysaccharides such as chitosan, cellulose, and starch are widely used in food packaging applications, as are reinforcing agents such as silver nanoparticles and cellulose nanostructures (e.g., cellulose nanocrystals and nanocellulose). The addition of reinforcing agents improves the thermal and mechanical stability of the polysaccharide films and nanocomposites. Here we highlighted the nanocomposites containing silver nanoparticles, which exhibited antimicrobial properties. Finally, it can be concluded that polysaccharide-based nanocomposites have sufficient properties to be tested as food packaging materials in a wide spectrum of applications.

Keywords: cellulose; chitosan; nanocomposites; nanoparticles; silver nanoparticles; starch.

Figure 1

The active properties of biopolymer films as the main compounds in active packaging materials. (Reproduced under Creative Commons License from [7]).

Figure 2

Distribution of the research articles based on WoS categories.

Figure 3

Yearwise distribution of the publications.

Figure 4

Countrywise distribution of the publications and the GDP (nominal) of the countries.

Figure 5

Density plot of the manually selected keywords of polysaccharide and nanoparticles.

Figure 6

(a) Examples of chitin content from different sources, (b) Chitin deacetylation methods to produce chitosan. (Reproduced from [36]).

Figure 7

Mechanism of conversion of chitin to chitosan. (Reproduced from [25]).

Figure 8

Antimicrobial action of chitosan against (A) Gram +ve bacteria, (B) Gram -ve bacteria, and (C) Fungi. (Reproduced from [37]).

Figure 9

Diverse synthesis routes of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs). (A) Top-down and bottom-up methods. (B) Physical synthesis method. (C) Chemical synthesis method. (D) Plausible synthesis mechanisms of green chemistry. (Reproduced from [42]).

Figure 10

Schematic representation of the solution casting method. (Reproduced from [43]).

Figure 11

Overview of mechanism of antimicrobial activity of silver nanoparticles. (Reproduced from [46]).

Figure 12

Antioxidant, antimicrobial, and pH-sensitive films based on chitosan, silver nanoparticles, and purple corn extract. (Reproduced with permission from [48]).

Figure 13

Conventional methods to synthesize cellulose nanoparticles. (Reproduced from [57]).

Figure 14

Overview of mechanism of formation of nanoclay-based nanocomposite. (I) Phase-separated microcomposite, (II) intercalated nanocomposites, and (III) exfoliated nanocomposites. (Reproduced from [70]).

Figure 15

(a) Schematic of cellulose repeating unit with the β-(1,4)-glycosidic linkage, dotted lines indicate intramolecular hydrogen bond; (b) hypothetical configuration of ordered (crystalline) and disordered (amorphous) regions in cellulose nanofibrils. (Reproduced from [112]).