Conventional passive packaging plays a crucial role in food manufacturing by protecting foods from various external influences. Most packaging materials are polymer-based plastics derived from fossil carbon sources, which are favored for their versatility, aesthetic appeal, and cost-effectiveness. However, the extensive use of these materials poses significant environmental challenges due to their fossil-based origins and persistence in the environment. Global plastic consumption for packaging is expected to nearly triple by 2060, exacerbating the ecological crisis. Moreover, globalization has increased access to a diverse range of foods from around the world, heightening the importance of packaging in providing healthier and safer foods with extended shelf life. In response to these challenges, there is a growing shift to eco-friendly active packaging that not only protects but also preserves the authentic qualities of food, surpassing the roles of conventional passive packaging. This article provides a comprehensive review on the viability, benefits, and challenges of implementing bio-based biodegradable polymers in active food packaging, with the dual goals of environmental sustainability and extending food shelf life.

It is a matter of common knowledge in the literature that engineered metal oxide nanoparticles have properties that are efficient for the design of innovative food/beverage packages. Although nanopackages have many benefits, there are circumstances when these materials are able to release nanoparticles into the food/beverage matrix. Once dispersed into food, engineered metal oxide nanoparticles travel through the gastrointestinal tract and subsequently enter human cells, where they display various behaviors influencing human health or wellbeing. This review article provides an insight into the antimicrobial mechanisms of metal oxide nanoparticles as essential for their benefits in food/beverage packaging and provides a discussion on the oral route of these nanoparticles from nanopackages to the human body. This contribution also highlights the potential toxicity of metal oxide nanoparticles for human health. The fact that only a small number of studies address the issue of food packaging based on engineered metal oxide nanoparticles should be particularly noted.

(1) Background: The identification of patients at risk for hepatitis B and C viral infection is a challenge for the clinicians and public health specialists. The aim of this study was to evaluate and compare the predictive performances of four machine learning-based models for the prediction of HBV and HCV status. (2) Methods: This prospective cohort screening study evaluated adults from the North-Eastern and South-Eastern regions of Romania between January 2022 and November 2022 who underwent viral hepatitis screening in their family physician’s offices. The patients’ clinical characteristics were extracted from a structured survey and were included in four machine learning-based models: support vector machine (SVM), random forest (RF), naïve Bayes (NB), and K nearest neighbors (KNN), and their predictive performance was assessed. (3) Results: All evaluated models performed better when used to predict HCV status. The highest predictive performance was achieved by KNN algorithm (accuracy: 98.1%), followed by SVM and RF with equal accuracies (97.6%) and NB (95.7%). The predictive performance of these models was modest for HBV status, with accuracies ranging from 78.2% to 97.6%. (4) Conclusions: The machine learning-based models could be useful tools for HCV infection prediction and for the risk stratification process of adult patients who undergo a viral hepatitis screening program.

The aim of this exploratory work, because of the existing bias on the size of the sample and some of the sociodemographic characteristics of the participants, was to investigate the Eastern European consumers’ beliefs and attitudes toward animal welfare, to perform a cross-country segmentation analysis and to observe possible differences with their Western European counterparts. For this purpose, a survey was conducted with 5508 consumers from 13 Eastern European countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Croatia, North Macedonia, Hungary, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Ukraine) using a questionnaire with nine statements about consumers beliefs regarding animal welfare (aspects of management, ethical issues about animals, and consequences of animal welfare on meat quality and price), one statement about the willingness to pay more for meat produced under better welfare conditions, and four statements regarding attitudes toward animal welfare. Differences between countries were detected for all the statements. Moreover, three clusters of consumers were identified: one with consumers indifferent towards animal welfare; one with consumers concerned about animal welfare, but they believe it is difficult to achieve; and one with consumers concerned about animal welfare, and they believe it is possible to achieve it.

The aim of this work is to obtain new food products enriched with bioactive compounds from concentrated grape juice microencapsulated by freeze drying using a whey protein isolate- chitosan system. The obtained powder showed an encapsulation efficiency of (86.1±4.0) %, with an anthocyanin mass fraction (expressed as cyanidin-3-O-glucoside equivalent) of (1.4±0.2) mg/g, while the total polyphenolic (expressed as gallic acid equivalents) and flavonoid (expressed as catechin equivalents) mass fractions were (3.3±0.6) and (1.6±0.5) mg/g, respectively. The confocal laser microscopy revealed the presence of the flavonoid pigments wrapped inside the matrix, whereas the anthocyanins were grouped into large and compact clusters. The microencapsulated powder was used for jelly formulation. The new food formulations have a satisfactory anthocyanin mass fraction ranging from (0.03±0.01) to (0.12±0.02) mg/g, while no significant differences were observed in flavonoid content. All the value-added jelly showed appreciable antioxidant activity. The in vitro digestibility results confirm a slow release of anthocyanins from the food matrices during simulated gastric digestion and a significant release of the bioactive compounds into the gut. The addition of microencapsulated powder caused a significant decrease in firmness, cohesiveness and springiness, leading to the destabilization of the gel structure, while reducing the attraction forces between the matrix components. The sensorial analysis indicated that the panellists preferred the sample with grape juice the most.