Award details

Defra Studentship: Biodegradable starch nano-composites for thermoformable film packaging for food products

Reference	BBS/E/F/00041714
Principal Investigator / Supervisor	Dr Roger Parker
Co-Investigators / Co-Supervisors
Institution	Quadram Institute Bioscience
Department	Quadram Institute Bioscience Department
Funding type	Research
Value (£)	4,351
Status	Completed
Type	Institute Project
Start date	01/06/2004
End date	31/01/2008
Duration	44 months

Abstract

The objective is to exploit the use of wheat as an industrial raw material and understand the effect of material variation in wheat starch and flour on final material properties for food packaging applications. The project will focus on property enhancement in terms of stiffness, strength, toughness, moisture barrier resistance, transparency, ageing resistance, microbial stability and biodegradability of starch-based packaging materials made by sheet extrusion and thermoforming processes, in order to extend their range of use in food packaging applications. It will promote the use of biodegradable food packaging by commercial exploitation of newly developed technologies and materials. This will be undertaken through collaboration between the consortium members, by producing demonstrator thermoformed food packaging products using plasticised thermoplastics starch (PTS) and nano-composite variants, to evaluate their functionality and cost-effectiveness for this purpose, together with their impact on the environment. It will lead to a plan of commercial exploitation of the new materials and technology. The project takes several novel approaches towards the development of cost-effective, fully biodegradable starch-based materials suitable for thermal forming of food packaging including: Thermoplastics starch nano-composites for mechanical and barrier property improvements by inclusion of nano-scale silicate layered fillers; Control of property stability of PTS materials for improvement of ageing resistance; Enhancement of moisture barrier properties of PTS materials by surface modification; Development of PTS sheet extrusion and thermoforming by both experimental and computer modelling studies.

Summary

unavailable

Committee	Closed Committee - Agri-food (AF)
Research Topics	X – not assigned to a current Research Topic
Research Priority	X – Research Priority information not available
Research Initiative	X - not in an Initiative
Funding Scheme	X – not Funded via a specific Funding Scheme

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