Page 41 - Food&Drink Magazine August 2019

Australian engineer develops food waste solution
An engineer recognised as one of Australia’s most innovative, Dr Sina Naficy, has developed flexible food sensors to reduce food waste.
FOOD TECHNOLOGY
UNIVERSITY of Sydney research fellow Dr Sina Naficy is among 30 engineers recognised in Australia’s Most Innovative Engineers 2019 list for his 3D-printed flexible food sensors. The new technology can detect gases generated by bacteria in packaged food and aims to reduce food waste.
Studies have found that two-thirds of food waste could be avoided if food quality could be evaluated. Naficy’s 3D-printed electrical gas sensors are designed to be printed on flexible substrates that can then be transferred on tothepackagingfilmpriorto
the packaging process.
“Our vision is to enable inkjet
or 3D-printing of such sensors to make them easily translatable for high throughput packaging industry,” said Naficy.
“In this approach, specifically designed inks will be provided to the manufacturers to perform the 3D inkjet printing of the sensors.”
Food sensors and flexible sensors hold great potential, says Naficy, as they can provide data driven information for consumers, retailers and producers about the state of the foodproduct.
Naficy and his team mainly focus on electrical sensors as the information can be recorded without the need to visually inspect the food. The electrical properties of the active sensor components will change with various chemicals (ammonia, carbon dioxide, fatty acids) that are produced during spoilage.
“The change in electrical properties of the active components of sensors will be detected wirelessly. Therefore, the user is able to monitor how the state of packaged food is changing over time,” he said.
“Through this approach, anybodyalongthefoodsupply
chain should be able to know exactly what the state of food is. Such information will assist for better decision making ... [and] help prevent unnecessary food waste.”
Naficy says the main obstacle is integrating the sensors in “very small electrical tags”.
“That being said, we have made great progresses in designing the materials and engineering them tobecome3Dprintable.” ✷
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