PFI-TT: Developing Protein-based Edible Coatings to Extend the Shelf Life of Fruits and Vegetables

这一创新-技术转化伙伴关系(PFI-TT)项目的更广泛影响/商业潜力是开发一种创新、低成本、健康和可持续的可食用涂层技术，可以延长水果和蔬菜的保质期，有效地同时应对食品保存和废物管理的挑战。在所有食物中，水果和蔬菜的损失类别最高，高达50%-60%的变质农产品被丢弃在垃圾填埋场。这项拟议的创新将为食品保鲜提供一种理想的、健康的蛋白质强化涂层。此外，涂层可清洗、可食用和有光泽，提供了一种全面但理想的食品保存解决方案，使消费者、卖家和农民受益。拟议的涂层技术将增强可食用涂层市场的窗口，专注于日益增长的注重健康和可持续发展的零售店和具有健康意识的消费者。除了减少食物浪费和经济损失外，这项预期的技术还可能对环境产生重大影响。例如，仅在美国，减少食物浪费每年就可以节省25%的淡水供应、39亿吨化肥、3亿桶石油和1.35亿吨温室气体。该项目还将有利于与科研翻译相关的学生的教育和培训。拟议的项目是基于开发一种生态友好和可生物降解的蛋白质基纳米复合涂层，该涂层可以应用于任何形状的易腐烂水果和蔬菜的表面。在实验室规模上，鸡蛋和大豆蛋白复合涂层显著延长了各种水果的保质期和美容外观。然而，试行规模的测试将提供对性能和成本矩阵的详细了解。为了充分了解所建议的涂层商业化的技术可行性，将探索各种蛋白质与纤维素纳米材料的最佳组合，通过选定的增塑剂和交联剂对蛋白质进行化学修饰，以及控制涂层方法的易于扩展的机制。该涂层将通过减少成熟、衰老、脱水和微生物生长速度来延长货架期。通过试点研究，该项目的可交付成果将是最低限度的可行产品。总体而言，以改善食品工业的环境性能和可持续性为最终目标，研究结果将导致基于蛋白质的廉价绿色涂层的开发，该涂层将延长水果的货架期，并增加可生物降解性、可洗性、可食性和美容外观的好处，并为产品的潜在商业化提供商业可行性分析。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Partnerships for Innovation - Technology Translation (PFI-TT) project is the development of an innovative, low cost, healthy and sustainable edible coating technology that can extend the shelf life of fruits and vegetables to combat the challenge of food preservation and waste management effectively and simultaneously. Among all foods, fruits and vegetables are the ones with the highest categories of losses, with up to 50-60% of spoiled produce discarded in landfills. The proposed innovation will provide a desirable and healthy protein-fortified coating for food preservation. Moreover, the coating is washable, edible, and glossy providing an all-encompassing yet desirable food preservation solution that benefits consumers, sellers, and farmers. The proposed coating technology will enhance the window for the markets of edible coatings that focuses on the growing health- and sustainability-focused retail stores and health-conscious consumers. Other than reducing food waste and economic losses, the anticipated technology could have significant environmental impacts. For example, reducing food waste can save 25% of the freshwater supply, 3.9 billion tons of fertilizer, 300 million barrels of oil, and 135 million tons of greenhouse gases every year in the USA alone. This project will also benefit the education and training of students related to research translation.The proposed project is based on the development of an eco-friendly and biodegradable protein-based nanocomposite coating that can be applied to the surface of perishable fruits and vegetables of any shape. On the lab scale, egg and soy-protein composite coatings have significantly extended the shelf life and cosmetic appearance of various fruits. However, testing on a pilot scale will provide a detailed understanding of performance and cost matrices. To fully understand the technological viability of commercializing the proposed coating, the optimum combinations of various proteins with cellulose nanomaterials, chemical modifications of proteins via selected plasticizers and crosslinkers, and easily scalable mechanisms for controlled coating methods will be explored. The coating will extend the shelf life by reducing maturation, senescence, dehydration, and microbial growth rate. The deliverables of this project will be a minimum viable product via pilot-scale studies. Overall, with an end goal of improving the environmental performance and sustainability of the food industry, the outcomes of the research will lead to the development of a protein-based inexpensive, and green coating that will enhance the shelf-life of fruits with the added benefits of biodegradability, washability, edibility, and cosmetic appearance and provide a business feasibility analysis for the potential commercialization of the product.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.