Food industry aiming to attend consumer's requirements is developing active packaging to provide quality and safety for packed foods. Therefore, the aim of this project is to develop active films incorporated with antimicrobial compounds and evaluate their efficacy in butter conservation. Celulosic based-films were incorporated with 0 (control) and 7% of sorbic acid. Antimicrobial film showed an inhibition halo of 3.4 cm for filamentous fungi and yeast. Butter samples were sliced and inoculated with filamentous fungi and yeast previously isolated from butter. The samples were wrapped with the active film involved in aluminum foil and stored at 7 ± 2 ºC. Microbiological analyses were carried out at 0, 10 and 20 days of storage. The initial counting of filamentous fungi and yeast was 3 x 10(6) FCU.g-1 and after 10 and 20 days the observed reductions was 1 log cycle (9 x 10(5) FCU.g-1) and 2 log cycles (8 x 10(4) FCU.g-1) for the butter in contact with the antimicrobial film respectively. Thickness values were: 22.5 ± 3 µm and 25 ± 5 µm, maximum strength; 37.4 ± 7 N and 52.4 ± 7 N and elongation: 1.7 ± 0.7% and 2.3 ± 0,7% for the 0 and 7% sórbico acid-films respectively. It can be concluded that the antimicrobial film showed more resistance and elongation, besides being efficient to inhibit filamentous fungi and yeast in butter.
Active packaging; shelf-of-life; food safety; butter
