Nanotechnology Developments in Active Food Packaging

Abstract

Nanofillers are fillers with particle diameters between 1 and 100 nm. Examples of such fillers are carbon blacks, synthetic silicas, and precipitated calcium carbonate. Food packaging often uses nanofillers to improve factors including heat and moisture resistance, gas leakage, and packing properties. The most popular nanofillers, such as nanorod, nanofibril, and nanotube varieties, are used in food packaging. The nanosized fillers can be either organic or inorganic, such as carbon nanotubes, graphene nanosheets, natural antimicrobials like nisin, natural biopolymers like chitosan, clay (such as montmorillonite and kaolinite), metals like silver, and metal oxides like TiO[[inf]]2[[/inf]]. Nanofillers offer antimicrobial properties through the creation of cutting-edge packaging technologies to sense biochemical or microbiological changes in food and detect the diseases and their root causes to be utilized as a product monitoring tool for food safety and to prevent food fraud. Laboratory studies, commercial applications, and development trends point to the existence of numerous categories of uses for nanofillers in the food packaging sector, including enhanced packaging, intelligent packaging, and active packaging. © 2025 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.