Food contact materials, including packaging, have to meet the ever-increasing demands of consumers. Indeed, they must be protective, attractive, practical, economical, resistant, suitable for various uses including microwave reheating, biodegradable and recyclable. The specifications for these new contact packs are increasingly complex. Producers must therefore design increasingly high-performance packaging that is part of a virtuous life cycle from design to end-of-life. Multi-disciplinary research and development teams have become a necessity to meet these new demands ever faster..
Structures
The LNE, drawing on close collaborations with research centers, public institutes, carries out its research activities as part of the Unité Mixte Technologique (UMT) ACTIA " SafeMat " and the Réseau Mixte Technologique (RMT) ACTIA "Propack Food".
UMT ACTIA "SAFEMAT
The ACTIA mixed technology unit (UMT) "SafeMat: Safety of contact materials and packaging", inaugurated in January 2017 and led by LNE, pools the experience of the two entities INRAE/AgroParisTech (UMR 782 SayFood - Ingénierie des Aliments et Bioproduits) and LNE around the issue of safety of contact materials and packaging. Products in contact are diverse and classified in four categories: i) foodstuffs; ii) cosmetics; iii) drugs and iv) biological liquids.
RMT ACTIA "Propack Food
Affiliated with the ACTIA (Association de Coordination Technique pour l'Industrie Agroalimentaire) network, the Réseau Mixte Technologique (RMT) ACTIA "ProPack Food " set up in 2008 brings together, on a national level, players from research, training, development and technology transfer involved in the "packaging/process/food" theme.
R&D challenges
LNE's research and development activities contribute to ensuring the safety of contact materials and packaging and to meeting several challenges.
1) Scientific issues: develop analytical and computational methods as well as robust tools for assessing the migration of IAS, NIAS, nanocomposites or other substances by building, for example, spectral or physicochemical property databases,
.2) Industrial issues:
- Equipping the industry with competitive tools for predicting regulatory compliance of packaging at early stages of product design, particularly with the emergence of biobased, biodegradable, nanocomposite and recyclable materials. .
- Assist in the development of best industrial practices (transfer of standards from the food sector to other sectors: medical, biotechnology, cosmetics, construction, flame-retardant textiles, etc.).
- Training modules incorporating tools and best practices tailored to manufacturers, packaging schools, specialized masters and control authorities.
- Train experts from industry, technical centers and regulatory bodies to support the acceptance of computational compliance prediction approaches.
- Support standardization and regulatory actions at European and international level.
3) Societal issues : Contribute to the environmental impact of materials and packaging (eco-design, lifespan, end-of-life, recycling, reuse, biodegradability), the safety of multi-purpose materials (e.g. flow in tubular products) and new technologies (management of emerging risks associated with polymer materials : active packaging, nanocomposites and bioplastics)
R&D objectives
The engineering approach to controlling the safety of materials in contact with food is the most promising, as it enables us to address the issue of contamination/migration at source, while supporting the innovation process in the packaging and food industries. It allows us to go beyond the diagnostic mission to propose preventive or corrective actions at the level of material design, packaging systems, or industrial practices (storage, traceability, etc.). Several lines of research have been defined to respond to several challenges identified for the industry:
1) Risk assessment: the aim is to ensure and enhance the health safety of an innovative packaging or packaging system with a new substance, material and/or condition of use or process.
2) Design : the aim is to help design "safer" packaging that can meet complex constraints with shorter product development times thanks to the use of calculation tools
.3) Optimization : the aim is to improve the quality of the packaging/product contact pair, maximizing product life with minimal chemical risk.
Research topics
Priority research themes are at the heart of LNE's Research and Development strategy.
Computer-aided health safety
The real or perceived safety of food packaging materials is currently the subject of much controversy. Plastic packaging in particular is the focus of criticism. Yet they are indispensable for food preservation and distribution.
The aim is to develop rapid and robust methodologies for designing packaging that can verify complex and contradictory constraints: maximized food shelf-life, minimized packaging mass, maximized recycled materials, minimal chemical risk, maximum mechanical resistance.
Functional barrier prediction
The use of functional barriers is frequent in the case of recycled materials, substances not specifically regulated. The most common and effective functional barriers are ethylene vinyl alcohol (EVOH), polyamide (PA), Silicon Oxide and aluminum oxide. However, some materials are sensitive to conditions of use and therefore lose their barrier properties during use.
A good model for predicting the behavior of functional barriers under varied conditions is important to improve the robustness of material transfer calculation tools for a development of recycled materials in direct food contact, and also for conventional multilayer materials, for which little is known about predicting the migration behavior of voluntarily added compounds.
Eco-design of packaging
Plastic food packaging for single-use is considered one of the sources of chemical contaminants in food. Such packaging consumes non-renewable resources, produces CO2 and is also considered one of the causes of marine pollution. In addition, the bill to combat waste and the circular economy sends a strong signal about the need to change production, distribution and consumption models.
Pushed by public authorities, the development and substitution of conventional materials by biosourced, biodegradable, recyclable and recycled, reusable materials is on the rise.
Aging and health safety of materials
Following the publication of the law against waste and the circular economy, demand for biosourced, biodegradable, recyclable and recycled, reusable green materials is growing strongly. Lack of knowledge and scientific setbacks are holding back the use of these materials for food.
Among the scientific hurdles, the development of good aging models for polymers (alone or in blends) is a key point for answering many questions.
Diffusion and thermodynamics of substances
The compliance of two-thirds of packaging or plastic materials in contact with food is tested by calculation. This possibility was introduced into European regulations as early as Directive 2002/72/EC, extended today by Regulation (EU) No. 10/2011 and its successive amendments.
The predictive power of the proposed migration calculation tools is highly dependent on the quality of the mathematical or molecular models that link the structure of molecules to their thermodynamic or transport properties.
Material deformation
The compliance of more than 60% of packaging or plastic materials in contact with food is tested by calculation. This possibility was introduced into European regulations as early as Directive 2002/72/EC, extended today by Regulation (EU) No. 10/2011 and its successive amendments.
In the same way as data on transport and thermodynamic properties, data on the composition of materials in contact (substance family, frequency of occurrence, concentration or concentration distribution) strongly affect the relevance of calculation results.