Cold Atmospheric Pressure Plasma Solutions for Sustainable Food Packaging

Abstract

Increasing the number of resistant bacteria resistant to treatment is one of the leading causes of death worldwide. These bacteria are created in wounds and injuries and can be transferred through hospital equipment. Various attempts have been made to treat these bacteria in recent years, such as using different drugs and new sterilization methods. However, some bacteria resist drugs, and other traditional methods cannot destroy them. In the meantime, various studies have shown that cold atmospheric plasma can kill these bacteria through different mechanisms, making cold plasma a promising tool to deactivate bacteria. This new technology can be effectively used in the food industry because it has the potential to inactivate microorganisms such as spores and microbial toxins and increase the wettability and printability of polymers to pack fresh and dried food. It can also increase the shelf life of food without leaving any residue or chemical effluent. This paper investigates cold plasma's potential, advantages, and disadvantages in the food industry and sterilization.

Keywords: bacterial inactivation; cold atmospheric plasma; food packaging; sterilization.

Figure 1

A schematic representation of different plasma reactors. (A) Atmospheric pressure plasma (APP), (B) dielectric barrier discharge (DBD), (C) radio frequency discharge (RFD), and (D) corona discharge [1].

Figure 2

The current advances in cold plasma include wound sterilization, medical device sterilization, food disinfection, and packaging.

Figure 3

The physical and chemical effects of cold plasma on the Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria schematically (A) [29], and the mechanism of cold plasma’s effect on microorganism deactivation (B) [29].

Figure 4

Cold plasma components (A) and the cold plasma’s effects on biofilms schematically (B) [30].

Figure 5

Direct treatment (A) [71] and indirect treatment of wounds (B) [72]; the effect of cold plasma on wound healing (C) [4].

Figure 6

Plasma-activated gas to disinfect the contaminated channels, such as endoscope tubes. (A) [84], direct (B) [12], and indirect plasma-activated water (PAW) to disinfect medical devices (C) [89], and different agents made in PAW (D) [90].

Figure 7

The action mechanism of cold plasma on the surface of food materials [111].

Figure 8

The schematic representation of the effect of CAP on food packaging materials [117].