Abstract
This review aims at summarizing the findings of studies published over the past 15 years on the application of modified atmosphere (MA) systems for shelf life extension of fish and fishery products. This review highlights the importance of CO2 in the preservation of seafood products, and underscores the benefits of combining MA technology with product storage in the superchilled temperature range. It is generally accepted that MA technology cannot improve product quality and should not be utilized as a substitute for good sanitation and strict temperature control. Benefits derived from application of MA, however, can significantly impact preservation of product quality and it subsequent shelf-life. For this reason, this review is the first of its kind to propose detailed handling and quality guidelines for fresh fish to realize the maximum benefit of MA technology.
Highlights
Modified atmosphere packaging is a technology that dates back to the 1930’s [1] and has been a critical area of research in terms of minimizing waste through spoilage in fishery products.Fish post-harvest losses were estimated in 2015 at 10 to 12 million tons, accounting for approximately10% of global capture and cultured fish [2]
For fish and fishery products, most gas mixtures do not include oxygen because high oxygen systems, in most cases, provide limited benefit to shelf life extension of fishery products [16,17,18,19]. This may be explained by the high rate of perishability of seafood, which results from psychrophilic spoilage bacteria growth that is combined with muscle degradation by endogenous enzymes and oxidative deterioration of the lipids, often rich in highly unsaturated fatty acids [20]
A study on bulk storage of fish under modified and controlled atmospheric conditions was conducted by Ruiz-Capillas and Moral in which the authors compared the residual effect of CO2 on the shelf life of whole gutted hake kept in boxes of ice for 12 days onboard of a fishing vessel under atmosphere composed of different mixtures of CO2 :O2 :N2 [38]
Summary
Modified atmosphere packaging is a technology that dates back to the 1930’s [1] and has been a critical area of research in terms of minimizing waste through spoilage in fishery products. For fish and fishery products, most gas mixtures do not include oxygen because high oxygen systems, in most cases, provide limited benefit to shelf life extension of fishery products [16,17,18,19] This may be explained by the high rate of perishability of seafood, which results from psychrophilic spoilage bacteria growth that is combined with muscle degradation by endogenous enzymes and oxidative deterioration of the lipids, often rich in highly unsaturated fatty acids [20]. It is not surprising that some studies report limited benefit to the quality and shelf life of fish and fishery products by the use of gases mixtures in MAP [25,26,27,28], while many others record significant extension in product shelf life [29,30,31,32,33,34,35]
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