An Intelligent Label for Freshness of Fish Based on a Porous Anodic Aluminum Membrane and Bromocresol Green

Emerging Approach for Fish Freshness Evaluation: Principle, Application and Challenges

Affected by micro-organisms and endogenous enzymes, fish are highly perishable during storage, processing and transportation. Efficient evaluation of fish freshness to ensure consumer safety and reduce raw material losses has received an increasing amount of attention. Several of the conventional freshness assessment techniques have plenty of shortcomings, such as being destructive, time-consuming and laborious. Recently, various sensors and spectroscopic techniques have shown great potential due to rapid analysis, low sample preparation and cost-effectiveness, and some methods are especially non-destructive and suitable for online or large-scale operations. Non-destructive techniques typically respond to characteristic substances produced by fish during spoilage without destroying the sample. In this review, we summarize, in detail, the principles and applications of emerging approaches for assessing fish freshness including visual indicators derived from intelligent packaging, active sensors, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and optical spectroscopic techniques. Recent developments in emerging technologies have demonstrated their advantages in detecting fish freshness, but some challenges remain in popularization, optimizing sensor selectivity and sensitivity, and the development of algorithms and chemometrics in spectroscopic techniques.

Shelf life extension of aquatic products by applying nanotechnology: a review

Aquatic products are extremely perishable due to their biological composition. Conventional preservation methods such as freezing, chemical treatments, packaging, and so forth are unable to inhibit enzymatic and microbiological spoilage efficiently and/or energy intensive and/or potentially toxic. However, the demand of consumers for aquatic products with long shelf life and high quality has urged the food industries to pursuit highly effective preservation methods for shelf life extension of aquatic products. Nanotechnology-related shelf life prolongation process possess the ability to overcome the drawbacks of conventional preservation technologies due to its unique properties. In this article, the aquatic products spoilage mechanisms, recent application of nanotechnology-related preservation techniques for aquatic products as well as the risk and regulation of nanomaterials have been reviewed. It has been shown that nanotechnology-related preservation techniques can effectively extend the shelf life without impairing the quality of aquatic products. However, the safety of nanotechnology is still remained controversial, therefore, the application of nanotechnology should be considered cautiously.

Freshness monitoring technology of fish products in intelligent packaging

Fish products are one of the preferred products in modern healthy diets, because they contain unqualified proteins, polyunsaturated fatty acids and a variety of vitamins and minerals. However, because of their vulnerability to deterioration, methods to maintain their freshness have attracted wide attention. Intelligent packaging can effectively monitor the quality and safety of fish products, provide warning, and has a great market and development potential. Therefore, this paper reviews the research progress of intelligent packaging technology used to monitor the freshness of fish products. The quality attributes of freshness of fish products are summarized. The classification, principle and latest application progress of three advanced technologies, indicator, sensor and radio frequency identification (RFID), are summarized. In addition, the advantages and disadvantages of the intelligent packaging technology for monitoring the freshness of products are discussed, and the current research results are summarized and prospected.