Abstract
The accumulation of high amounts of petro-based plastics is a growing environmental devastation issue, leading to the urgent need to innovate eco-safe packaging materials at an equivalent cost to save the environment. Among different substitutes, starch-based types and their blends with biopolymers are considered an innovative and smart material alternative for petrol-based polymers because of their abundance, low cost, biodegradability, high biocompatibility, and better-quality film-forming and improved mechanical characteristics. Furthermore, starch is a valuable, sustainable food packaging material. The rising and growing importance of designing starch-based films from various sources for sustainable food packaging purposes is ongoing research. Research on “starch food packaging” is still at the beginning, based on the few studies published in the last decade in Web of Science. Additionally, the functionality of starch-based biodegradable substances is technically a challenge. It can be improved by starch modification, blending starch with other biopolymers or additives, and using novel preparation techniques. Starch-based films have been applied to packaging various foods, such as fruits and vegetables, bakery goods, and meat, indicating good prospects for commercial utilization. The current review will give a critical snapshot of starch-based films’ properties and potential applicability in the sustainable smart (active and intelligent) new packaging concepts and discuss new challenges and opportunities for starch bio composites.
Highlights
The results reported that potassium sorbate reduced the tensile strength and young modulus and improved strain at break
The mechanical characteristics of starch films strongly depend on the water content due to its hydrophilic nature; the lower amylose content significantly favors higher tensile strength (TS) and Young modulus of films made from potato, wheat, and corn starches, respectively
Zhang et al [171] extracted anthocyanin from cabbage and sweet potato and incorporated it into starch and polyvinyl alcohol films to indicate shrimp freshness. They prepared the pH-sensitive films that could be used as an indicator to monitor the shrimp freshness and exhibited effective color change during shrimp spoilage. Another intelligent packaging to monitor the freshness of shrimp has been developed using a starch/polyvinyl alcohol film base incorporating betacyanins from different plant sources, such as red pitaya flesh extract (RPFE), prickly pear fruit extract (PPFE), red beetroot extract (RBRE), globe amaranth flower extract (GAFE), and red amaranth leaf extract (RALE)
Summary
Plastic was used as an alternate material for packing purposes as it has both mechanical strength and moisture barrier Their long-term environmental persistence creates pollution problems and an unnecessary burden on food processing industries. It raises the need for an alternate packing material that is safe for consumption and is biodegradable. Biopolymers, especially different types of starch, chitosan, whey, gums (seaweed-based gums (e.g., alginate, carrageenan)), plant-origin gums (e.g., mastic gum), and microbial gums (e.g., xanthan gum, cellulose), are recommended for coatings and packaging purposes alone or in blends to improve the mechanical properties [9,10,11,12]. This review paper provides in-depth information on the preparation, properties, and applications of starch-based films
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