The new transparent patch can detect food pathogens!

[China Packaging News] How do you know if the meat you bought from the supermarket is still edible after a while?

Researchers at McMaster University in Canada have developed a test method that can answer this somewhat complicated but critical question, letting us know whether the food we are eating is safe.

According to the World Health Organization report, there are more than 600 million cases of food poisoning caused by food poisoning worldwide each year, and there are even 420,000 deaths, about 30% of which occur in children under the age of 5 ; on the contrary, general food manufacturers In order to be safe, the shelf life will be marked too early, which in some ways will cause many foods to be discarded in a state where they are actually edible, causing unnecessary waste.

McMaster University ’s mechanical and chemical engineers and biochemists have collaborated to develop transparent patches printed with harmless molecules that can detect signals generated when pollution occurs. This transparent patch can be directly combined with food packaging to directly monitor whether harmful pathogens (such as E. coli and Salmonella ) are produced.

This technology has been published in the scientific journal " ACS Nano ", in the future may replace the traditional way of marking food and beverages with expiration date, to avoid inaccurate and arbitrary ways to tell consumers which food should be discarded.

The study's lead author, McMaster University engineering graduate student and research assistant Hanie Yousefi also said that people want to ensure that the meat they buy is within the shelf life before using it, they need a more reliable way than marking the expiration date.

Therefore, the research team has developed this kind of material that can monitor the quality of food in real time. When harmful pathogens appear in the food or beverage in the package, the signal on the package will be generated, and the information obtained by the monitoring can be accessed through the user ’s smartphone or Other simple instruments to interpret, the test itself will not affect the environment inside the package.

The research team called this new packaging material " Sentinel Wrap " . In this study, chemical engineer Carlos Filipe and biochemical mechanical engineer Tohid Didar worked closely to develop new detection technology that can print DNA molecules that detect contaminated food pathogens on food packaging materials. The food signal processing technology detected by the material It was developed by Yingfu Li laboratory of McMaster college student chemist . The research team said that mass production of this packaging material is not complicated and cheap.

Didar , an infectious disease researcher at the McMaster Institute, said food manufacturers can easily and easily incorporate this packaging material into production lines. The research team said that in order for the technology to enter the market in the future, it must also be approved by the cooperation of business partners. The scope of this technology can not only be applied to food packaging, but other application methods include: bandages that can show whether the wound is infected, or Used for packaging surgical instruments to confirm that the equipment is in a sterile state, etc.