Antimicrobial efficacy of carvacrol-loaded curdlan hydrogels for enhancing shelf-life in seafood packaging applications

Hong-Ting Victor Lin; Yi-Chi Yu; Shu-Han Yu; Yu-Chieh Chou; Hsuan-Ju Lin; Shella Permatasari Santoso; Shin-Ping Lin

doi:10.1016/j.ijfoodmicro.2024.110976

Antimicrobial efficacy of carvacrol-loaded curdlan hydrogels for enhancing shelf-life in seafood packaging applications

Int J Food Microbiol. 2024 Nov 15:428:110976. doi: 10.1016/j.ijfoodmicro.2024.110976. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Hong-Ting Victor Lin¹, Yi-Chi Yu², Shu-Han Yu³, Yu-Chieh Chou⁴, Hsuan-Ju Lin⁵, Shella Permatasari Santoso⁶, Shin-Ping Lin⁷

Affiliations

¹ Department of Food Science, National Taiwan Ocean University, 2 Pei-Ning Road, Keelung 20224, Taiwan; Center of Excellence for the Oceans, National Taiwan Ocean University, No. 2, Pei-Ning Road, Keelung 202, Taiwan.
² School of Food Safety, Taipei Medical University, Taipei 11031, Taiwan.
³ Institute of Biotechnology, National Taiwan University, Taipei 10617, Taiwan.
⁴ Ph.D. Program in Drug Discovery and Development Industry, Taipei Medical University, 250 Wu-Hsing Street, Taipei 11031, Taiwan.
⁵ Department of Food Science, National Taiwan Ocean University, 2 Pei-Ning Road, Keelung 20224, Taiwan.
⁶ Department of Chemical Engineering, Widya Mandala Surabaya Catholic University, Kalijudan 37, Surabaya 60114, Indonesia.
⁷ School of Food Safety, Taipei Medical University, Taipei 11031, Taiwan; Ph.D. Program in Drug Discovery and Development Industry, Taipei Medical University, 250 Wu-Hsing Street, Taipei 11031, Taiwan; Research Center of Biomedical Device, Taipei Medical University, 250 Wu-Hsing Street, Taipei 11031, Taiwan; TMU Research Center for Digestive Medicine, Taipei Medical University, 250 Wu-Hsing Street, Taipei 11031, Taiwan. Electronic address: splin0330@tmu.edu.tw.

PMID: 39561480
DOI: 10.1016/j.ijfoodmicro.2024.110976

Abstract

As global warming and the energy crisis receive increasing attention, the development of ecofriendly functional food packaging materials has also garnered significant interest. In this study, curdlan was combined with foaming agents (Cremodan and xanthan) and a crosslinking agent (sodium trimetaphosphate) to form a porous curdlan hydrogel. The material properties of the curdlan hydrogels were characterized using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, and a thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Results showed that the 2 % curdlan hydrogel exhibited a high water content (96.2 %), and swelling (89.2 %) and reswelling abilities (89.5 %), with a distinctly porous structure and excellent thermostability. These properties make it suitable for loading carvacrol, resulting in the formation of a carvacrol/curdlan hydrogel. In the results of antimicrobial testing, the carvacrol/curdlan hydrogel showed greater antimicrobial properties against Shewanella putrefaciens (32.3 mm) and Vibrio harveyi (33.1 mm) compared to V. parahaemolyticus (24.5 mm) in inhibition zone test. Noteworthy was the certain degree of antimicrobial ability of the carvacrol/curdlan hydrogel, which continuously exhibited microbial inhibition of the total viable count (TVC) of the no-inoculated and V. parahaemolyticus-inoculated group on sea bass fillets during 6 days of storage. In addition, the carvacrol/curdlan hydrogel inhibited the S. putrefaciens-caused microbial spoilage of fish. However, the continuous antibacterial ability of carvacrol/curdlan hydrogel needs to be improved. In future work, changing the porous size of curdlan hydrogel to control the carvacrol release for elongating the durability and long-term usage will be accomplished to fit the need in functional packaging applications.

Keywords: Active food packaging; Antimicrobial packaging; Carvacrol; Curdlan; Hydrogel.