Title: Reactivity of Food Preservatives in Dispersed Systems
Abstract: Food preservatives are substances added to foods to inhibit the growth of micro-organisms. This action usually requires that the preservative be absorbed by the organism in question and thus the chemical structure must be such as to allow passage through the microbial cell wall. Foods are multi-phase systems where one of the phases is often oil. Numerous surfactants are also likely to be present. A wide variety of surfactants may also be added to foods; these are generally non-ionic. The known tendency for solutes that are sparingly soluble in water to become associated with surfactant micelles or aggregates leads one to expect that food preservatives may also be found associated with micellar structures in foods; this has undoubted consequences for the activity (and reactivity) of these solutes. This chapter describes a stage in the development of a model for the distribution of food preservatives in multi-phase foods; it considers the quaternary system water + surfactant + oil + preservative to gain understanding of the affinity of surfactants for benzoic and sorbic acids. The implications of preservative-surfactant interactions are considered in the chapter for the specific case of the reaction between sorbic acid and thiols. The latter is potentially the most reactive species toward sorbic acid in foods.
Publication Year: 1991
Publication Date: 1991-01-01
Language: en
Type: book-chapter
Indexed In: ['crossref']
Access and Citation
Cited By Count: 7
AI Researcher Chatbot
Get quick answers to your questions about the article from our AI researcher chatbot