Chitosan, a sustainable alternative for food packaging
Friday, January 9, 2015 - 09:00
in Earth & Climate
Riverbanks and oceans are full of plastic; there are bits of this material in the organism of a large number of fish, etc. Packaging and wrappers made from petroleum by-products are seriously damaging the environment. The search for less harmful materials has driven many pieces of research; among them that of Itsaso Leceta. This researcher has shown in her work entitled Quality attributes of map packaged ready-to-eat baby carrots by using chitosan-based coatings, that chitosan films are effective in preserving some of the properties of carrots as well as in preserving them longer. What is more, chitosan films are less harmful for the environment than those made of plastic in various impact categories.