Embalagens Sustentáveis: Soluções Baseadas na Natureza para a Conservação dos Alimentos

The main objective of the project is to develop new sustainable food packaging incorporating bacteriocins as a novel, safe alternative to the use of conventional food packaging and chemical preservatives by solving these challenges. To achieve this, a five-stage bacteriocin discovery and development pipeline will be implemented. This will utilize bacteriocins produced by LAB strains isolated by the PI group. The novel bacteriocins will be sequenced, characterized, also in terms of their mode of action and safety. In addition, a method will be developed to produce food-grade bacteriocins on a large scale. This includes the fermentation of cheese whey and the incorporation of this bacteriocin formulation into a food-grade film. This strategy will overcome the difficulties of extracting primary metabolites such as bacteriocins from whey and will pave the way for the application of novel protective films to replace petroleum-based plastics in food packaging. Therefore, new coatings and films will be developed by using food-grade edible materials (alginate, gelatine and cheese whey) with the incorporation of bacteriocin-whey formulation. The bioactive films will be tested to protect cheese from pathogen and spoilage microorganisms (bacteria and fungi) during ripening and storage. Among the bacteriocin-producing LAB strains isolated by IITAA researchers, Enterococcus faecalis strains were shown to produce bacteriocins (enterocins) with high activity against pathogens and spoilage microorganisms. Cheese whey will be chosen as a substrate for LAB growth and enteriocin production, as it is a matrix with high nutritional value, containing more than half of the solids present in milk, making it suitable for LAB growth. In addition, whey protein is a component of the film formulation, so no further steps were required to purify the bacteriocins. Therefore, a bioactive film will be developed using gelatin, glycerol and a bacteriocin-whey solution prepared by fermentation of cheese whey by the bacteriocinogenic strains. The efficacy of such film will be evaluated in cheese production and storage. We bring together the unique expertise required to carry out this project by combining basic research into the identification and characterization of bacteriocins with applied research into whey fermentation, nanofiltration and the protection of bio-based food packaging. The specific objectives are: - Sequencing and characterization of the bacteriocins produced by LAB strains from the IITAA collection. - Evaluate the mode of action and safety of the bacteriocins. - Improve the productivity of bacteriocin-producing strains. - Optimize whey fermentation production processes (reduce costs and increase product yield). - Optimize and scale-up of bacteriocin production. - Develop a new bacteriocin-infused protective film for food packaging. - Investigate the activity of the new bacteriocin-films against spoilage and pathogenic microorganisms. - Evaluate the efficacy of bacteriocin-infused protective film to protect cheeses and extend shelf-life.