Application of surface-modified functional packaging in food storage: A comprehensive review

Innovations in food packaging systems could meet the evolving needs of the market; emerging concepts of non-migrating technologies reduce the negative migration of preservatives from packaging materials, extend shelf life, and improve food quality and safety. Non-migratory packaging activates the surface of inert materials through pretreatment to generate different active groups. The preservative is covalently grafted with the resin of the pretreated packaging substrate through the graft polymerization of the monomer and the coupling reaction of the polymer chain. The covalent link not only provides the required surface properties of the material for a long time but also retains the inherent properties of the polymer. This technique is applied to the processing for durable, stable, and easily controllable packaging widely. This article reviews the principles of various techniques for packaging materials, surface graft modification, and performance characterization of materials after grafting modification. Potential applications in the food industry and future research trends are also discussed.

Quartz crystal microbalance and atomic force microscopy to characterize mimetic systems based on supported lipids bilayer

Quartz Crystal Microbalance (QCM) with dissipation and Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) are two characterization techniques that allow describing processes taking place at solid-liquid interfaces. Both are label-free and, when used in combination, provide kinetic, thermodynamic and structural information at the nanometer scale of events taking place at surfaces. Here we describe the basic operation principles of both techniques, addressing a non-specialized audience, and provide some examples of their use for describing biological events taking place at supported lipid bilayers (SLBs). The aim is to illustrate current strengths and limitations of the techniques and to show their potential as biophysical characterization techniques.

Study of Amyloid Fibers Using Atomic Force Microscopy

Atomic force microscopy (AFM) provides high-resolution images of the topography of amyloid fibers adsorbed on surfaces. This information is very useful to study their molecular assembly under various conditions. This chapter describes the basic protocols required to deposit fibers on flat surfaces and discusses some of the practical issues required to operate a good commercial microscope setup to obtain appropriate high-resolution AFM topographic images of amyloid fibers.