فصلنامه علوم و فنون بسته بندی
پیاپی 28 (زمستان 1395)

In recent years, by appearance of nanotechnology and its entrance to different industries, we have observed its dramatic improvements in various aspects. Food packaging industry is also one of these industries encountering many welcomes following a very good impact of nanotechnology on the improvement of various features in the packaging. On the other hand, Nan particles used in packaging as well as other components may migrate in to the food matrix and create problems for food safety. The major concern for applying nanotechnology is based on the fear relating to the small size of Nan particles since the chemical and physical characteristics of such tiny materials may be quite different from those of their micro-scale counterparts. Nowadays, new knowledge must be established about how Nan materials-based processes could affect human health. In this article, after a brief statement about the importance and applications of nanotechnology in the food packaging, quantitative and qualitative techniques for characterizing Nan particles are introduced in order to assess their migration and safety issues. In addition, general aspects of Nan particles migration, measurement techniques and also some migration rules about using nanotechnology in the field of packaging are summarized.

Based on serious environmental problems of plastics derived from petroleum, nowadays polysaccharide films and coatings are attracted a lot of attention. Unlike most traditional packaging, these films are biodegradable and help to reduce environmental pollutions. These Polysaccharide films include chitosan, starch, alginate and etc. The consumers also are demanding products without chemical preservatives. Therefore, it seems that essential oils are suitable substituents. Essential oils are interesting compounds for biodegradable packaging mainly due to their natural origin and useful functional properties such as antioxidant and antimicrobial properties. The aim of this review is to consider the effect of various essential oils on the properties of polysaccharide films, including their microstructure, optical properties, antioxidant and antimicrobial activity, etc. According to the studies, incorporation of essential oils affects the continuity of polymer matrix and improves the water barrier, antioxidant and antimicrobial properties. On the other hand, essential oils provide the films with lower transparency.

The use of chemical preservatives and their adverse effects on consumer health, have been caused concerns for health authorities and consumers. As a result, the food producers are thinking about safe and healthier methods for preparation of foods by using natural or green preservatives instead of the synthetic chemicals. One of these methods is using essential oils and plant extracts as natural antibacterial additives. Cinnamon essential oils is a good source of antifungal, antimicrobial and strong antioxidant compounds that can prevent the growth of microorganisms which caused spoilage. Recently the tendency to use active edible coatings and films in food packaging has been increased drastically because of their positive effect on increasing the shelf life of products. In this review paper, the properties of cinnamon essential oils and its effect on the properties of edible films and coatings have been discussed and also the application of active films containing cinnamon essential oil in the food packaging and their effect on increasing the shelf life of different food products have been reviewed.

Grading and packaging of agricultural products is very important in the maintenance and protection, product standardization in terms of uniformity in Quantity and quality and access to new markets and increase exports and foreign exchange technology. By creating competition in the market of agricultural products we can increase the utilization of agricultural products.
Unlike the developed countries that is using of important technologies such as Ideal conditions of storage and marketing, such a thing is not done as efficient as in Iran ,.and so in some cases crops are without appropriate customer-friendly as it should be there. Due to the vulnerability of the agricultural sector as the most important economic sector in developing countries, including Iran, and the need to reduce agricultural waste and also focus on increasing revenues from non-oil exports, in this paper, the necessity of grading and packaging of Date products, review the situation and problems in exporting of Dates and proposed solutions will be discussed.

Wood characteristics and properties shows suitability for packaging and satisfying the consumers. Standardized connections, fittings and standard locks, consumer materials, accessories on transportation and storage, knobs and notification of important symptoms are of great importance in wooden packaging that should be considered. The use of virgin materials and fulfilment of the rules and requirements in manufacturing of wooden packaging have great influence on the delivery and consumer satisfaction. The reduction in possible losses and costs during product packaging, distribution and long-term storage could decrease costs for producer and satisfy the consumer. In this paper, using sources of up to date standards, it was attempted to introduce the most important characteristics of wooden packaging and propounding important tips on how to build a wooden packaging and fulfilment of regulations in producing them to gain packaging objectives.

The purpose of storehouse establishment in governmental or private organizations is to provide, preserve and make the required utensils available, otherwise their workflow and activities will be interrupted. Foods in stores should be stacked in a way that besides inhibitions of physical and chemical changes, financial and life-threatening damages could be prevented. On the other hand, urban transport networks should be designed and constructed regularly and systematically in a way that each of its components can do their responsibilities without making any problems in the system. Therefore, the aim of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of art education in two aspects: storage and layout and transportation. This is a practical semi experimental study. Students of faculty of nutrition and food science in Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences were intuited for participation in this study. The subjects (n=60) were randomly divided to case and control groups. The research tool was a questionnaire designed by author according to previous researches and its validity was established by professional persons and reliability was checked by Cronbach's alpha coefficients=0.946. In pretest, the questionnaire was first completed by cases, and then the educational package was taught to cases in five workshops lasting 2 hours and there after both groups participated in a post-test. Results showed that there was significant difference between two groups, by t-test and educational package had been useful in improving packaging design. Moreover, Fridman test showed that there was a difference between two factors and storage and layout had higher priority compared to transportation.

Poly lactic acid (PLA)Nan composite has various applications in food packaging due to their biodegradable character. However, application of PLA Nan composite is somewhat limited by its limited range of physical properties such as thermal stability and gas barrier properties and its brittle nature. Dispersion of the Nan clay in the polymer matrix can provide remarkable improvement of PLA Nan composites properties. In this study, involved mechanisms in natural weathering and its effect on changing the properties of PLA Nan composites during storage have been investigated. Chemical degradation of polymers is a very important process and irreversible, which affects the performance of all plastic materials in packaging life and leads finally to the loss of its protectively. Natural weathering (or outdoor weathering) have been used extensively In order to assess the durability of food packaging polymers. The destruction process of Oxidative photo degradation phenomenon or photo oxidation of packaging Nan composites depends on several factors, and the most important factor would be the sunlight that is responsible for the initial or primer of photo process in polymer degradation. The nature of the main oxidation products of packaging Nan composite is now is well known although the mechanisms by which oxidation occurs are somewhat controversial. Studies showed that physicochemical and fuctional properties of PLA and clay PLA/Cloisite 30B Nan composites change during maintenance. Also, a combination of low molecular weight has been created in polymers, and this change was increased with increase in clay loadings. Crystallinity parameter increases during maintenance. Glass transition temperature (Tg) decreased and this property decreases with increasing clay content. Loss of mechanical response as a result of polymer optical deterioration is evident. Accordingly, it was reported that most of the tensile properties of PLA films were affected by UV irradiation. The interring of clay fillers in the PLA Nan composites in addition to improving the physical properties of the resulting film (fragility, barrerly of gaseous and so on), could be theirs degradability to lower than six months that a major problem in the context of synthetic polymers for food packaging.