A bioactive packaging material based on chitosan (CS) incorporated with benzyl isothiocyanate (BITC) and α−cyclodextrin (α−CD) was fabricated to evaluate its preservative effects on fresh beef stored at 4 °C for 12 d according to the quality analysis. The Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectrum revealed that the major structural moiety of BITC was embedded in the cavity of α−CD, except for the thiocyanate group. FTIR and X-ray diffraction analysis further verified that intermolecular interactions were formed between the BITC−α−CD and CS film matrix. The addition of BITC−α−CD decreased the UV light transmittance of pure CS film to lower than 63% but still had enough transparency for observing packaged items. The CS−based composite film displayed a sustainable antibacterial capacity and an enhanced antioxidant activity. Moreover, the total viable counts, total volatile base nitrogen, pH, thiobarbituric acid–reactive substances, and sensory evaluation of the raw beef treated with the CS−based composite film were 6.31 log colony-forming unit (CFU)/g, 19.60 mg/100 g, 6.84, 0.26 mg/kg, and 6.5 at 12 days, respectively, indicating the favorable protective efficacy on beef. These results suggested that the fabricated CS−based composite film has the application potential to be developed as a bioactive food packaging material, especially for beef preservation.

Beef freshness is a critical indicator of meat quality and safety, and its rapid, non-destructive detection is of significant importance for ensuring consumer health and enhancing quality control throughout the meat industry chain. This study developed a novel methodology for non-destructive beef freshness assessment using visible and near-infrared (Vis-NIR) spectroscopy combined with machine learning, explainable artificial intelligence (xAI) techniques, and the SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) framework. An improved hybrid heuristic method, particle swarm optimization–genetic algorithm (PSOGA), was used for feature selection, optimizing the wavelength subset for predicting beef quality indicators, including total volatile basic nitrogen (TVB-N) and color parameters (L*, a*, and b*). The eXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) was employed for regression modeling, and the results showed that PSOGA significantly outperforms traditional methods, with the PSOGA-XGBoost model achieving a satisfactory prediction accuracy (R²p values of 0.9504 for TVB-N, 0.9540 for L*, 0.8939 for a*, and 0.9416 for b*). The SHAP framework identified the key wavelengths as 1236 nm and 1316 nm for TVB-N, 728 nm for L*, 576 nm for a*, and 604 nm for b*, providing valuable insights into the determination of key wavelengths and enhancing the interpretability of the model. The results demonstrated the effectiveness of PSOGA and SHAP, providing a promising analytical method for monitoring beef freshness.

The 3-(Methylthio) propyl isothiocyanate (MTPITC)-loaded inclusion complex prepared by α-cyclodextrin (α-CD) was incorporated into chitosan (CS) film to fabricate a packaging material for fresh chicken meat preservation. Scanning electron microscope images indicated homogenous dispersion of the MTPITC-α-CD in CS polymer. Fourier-transform infrared and X-ray diffraction techniques revealed that MTPITC-α-CD was incorporated into the CS film matrix by the physical interactions. The introduction of MTPITC-α-CD improved the UV-vis light-blocking ability, with a slight loss of transparency. Although the water solubility and water vapor barrier capacity were not significantly influenced by the addition of MTPITC-α-CD, the antioxidant attribute was significantly enhanced. The CS-MTPITC-α-CD film displayed obvious and sustained suppressive effects against Salmonella typhimurium, with the inhibition zone diameters of 14.7 mm at 12 h and 7.3 mm at 24 h, respectively. Moreover, the quality index analysis indicated that the CS-MTPITC-α-CD film-wrapped fresh chicken, during refrigerated storage, exhibited better preservative efficacy than the control groups, with the total viable counts of 6.5 Log CFU/g, total volatile base nitrogen of 8.4 mg/100 g, pH of 6.6, thiobarbituric acid-reactive substances of 0.2 mg/kg, and the sensory score of 5 at day 16. Collectively, these results suggest that CS-MTPITC-α-CD film is a prospective packaging candidate for delaying the quality deterioration of chicken meat.