73D-21 |
Effect of polypropylene film barrier for fatty and high moisture food packages with recycled paperboard |
Y. S. SONG and V. Komolprasert. National Center for Food Safety & Technology, U.S. Food & Drug Administration, IIT Moffett Campus, 6502 S. Archer Rd., Summit-Argo, IL 60501 Food industry's interest has expanded the use of recycled pulp to microwavable packaging of foods with high fat and moisture. Those applications require a plastic layer in between the paperboard and food to provide the necessary barrier properties. The safety evaluation of recycled paperboard for food use may be dependent upon the effectiveness of the functional barrier. This research was undertaken to measure the migration of contaminants from paperboard into food simulants through the polypropylene (PP) film and to determine if the FDA's 0.5ppb dietary concentration limit was exceeded. Anthracene, benzophenone, methyl stearate and pentachlorophenol are chemical surrogates chosen to represent contaminants that could be found in recycled paper/paperboard. Each surrogate was spiked into a test specimen made of seven thin virgin paper layers at an approximate range of 1-50mg/kg. The test specimen was laminated with PP films and subjected to migration experiments using a compression cell maintained at 100oC for 2 hours. The concentration of the surrogates present in the test specimen and in pure ethanol, 2-propanol, and 10% ethanol/water food simulating solvents was determined using analytical methods developed and validated using a gas chromatograph with flame ionization and electron capture detection. The results show that although the concentrations of the surrogates present in the food simulants decreased with an increase in PP film thickness, they were still high and resulted in dietary concentrations in excess of the 0.5ppb limit. Among the surrogates studied, benzophenone migrated more rapidly than the other surrogates, giving the highest concentration in the food simulants. Regression analysis of the benzophenone data suggests that the maximum allowable residual concentrations in recycled paperboard manufactured for food contact that would keep migration at or below the 0.5ppb dietary concentration limit were 0.16, 0.20, and 0.24mg/kg for the PP film thickness of 0.03, 0.07, and 0.13mm, respectively.
Session 73D, Food Packaging
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