What Is Left for Real-Life Lactate Monitoring? Current Advances in Electrochemical Lactate (Bio)Sensors for Agrifood and Biomedical Applications

Monitoring of lactate is spreading from the evident clinical environment, where its role as a biomarker is notorious, to the agrifood ambit as well. In the former, lactate concentration can serve as a useful indicator of several diseases (e.g., tumour development and lactic acidosis) and a relevant value in sports performance for athletes, among others. In the latter, the spotlight is placed on the food control, bringing to the table meaningful information such as decaying product detection and stress monitoring of species. No matter what purpose is involved, electrochemical (bio)sensors stand as a solid and suitable choice. However, for the time being, this statement seems to be true only for discrete measurements. The reality exposes that real and continuous lactate monitoring is still a troublesome goal. In this review, a critical overview of electrochemical lactate (bio)sensors for clinical and agrifood situations is performed. Additionally, the transduction possibilities and different sensor designs approaches are also discussed. The main aim is to reflect the current state of the art and to indicate relevant advances (and bottlenecks) to keep in mind for further development and the final achievement of this highly worthy objective

Recent Advancements in the Technologies Detecting Food Spoiling Agents

To match the current life-style, there is a huge demand and market for the processed food whose manufacturing requires multiple steps. The mounting demand increases the pressure on the producers and the regulatory bodies to provide sensitive, facile, and cost-effective methods to safeguard consumers’ health. In the multistep process of food processing, there are several chances that the food-spoiling microbes or contaminants could enter the supply chain. In this contest, there is a dire necessity to comprehend, implement, and monitor the levels of contaminants by utilizing various available methods, such as single-cell droplet microfluidic system, DNA biosensor, nanobiosensor, smartphone-based biosensor, aptasensor, and DNA microarray-based methods. The current review focuses on the advancements in these methods for the detection of food-borne contaminants and pathogens

Potential use of electronic noses, electronic tongues and biosensors, as multisensor systems for spoilage examination in foods

Development and use of reliable and precise detecting systems in the food supply chain must be taken into account to ensure the maximum level of food safety and quality for consumers. Spoilage is a challenging concern in food safety considerations as it is a threat to public health and is seriously considered in food hygiene issues accordingly. Although some procedures and detection methods are already available for the determination ofspoilage in food products, these traditional methods have some limitations and drawbacks as they are time-consuming,labour intensive and relatively expensive. Therefore, there is an urgent need for the development of rapid, reliable, precise and non-expensive systems to be used in the food supply and production chain as monitoring devices to detect metabolic alterations in foodstuff. Attention to instrumental detection systems such as electronic noses, electronic tongues and biosensors coupled with chemometric approaches has greatly increased because they have been demonstrated as a promising alternative for the purpose of detecting and monitoring food spoilage. This paper mainly focuses on the recent developments and the application of such multisensor systems in the food industry. Furthermore, the most traditionally methods for food spoilage detection are introduced in this context as well. The challenges and future trends of the potential use of the systems are also discussed. Based on the published literature, encouraging reports demonstrate that such systems are indeed the most promising candidates for the detection and monitoring of spoilage microorganisms in different foodstuff

A comprehensive review to evaluate the synergy of intelligent food packaging with modern food technology and artificial intelligence field

This study reviews recent advancements in food science and technology, analyzing their impact on the development of intelligent food packaging within the complex food supply chain. Modern food technology has brought about intelligent food packaging, which includes sensors, indicators, data carriers, and artificial intelligence. This innovative packaging helps monitor food quality and safety. These innovations collectively aim to establish an unbroken chain of food safety, freshness, and traceability, from production to consumption. This research explores the components and technologies of intelligent food packaging, focusing on key indicators like time–temperature indicators, gas indicators, freshness indicators, and pathogen indicators to ensure optimal product quality. It further incorporates various types of sensors, including gas sensors, chemical sensors, biosensors, printed electronics, and electronic noses. It integrates data carriers such as barcodes and radio-frequency identification to enhance the complexity and functionality of this system. The review emphasizes the growing influence of artificial intelligence. It looks at new advances in artificial intelligence that are driving the development of intelligent packaging, making it better at preserving food freshness and quality. This review explores how modern food technologies, especially artificial intelligence integration, are revolutionizing intelligent packaging for food safety, quality, reduced waste, and enhanced traceability

Development of Bio-based Nanocomposites for Biosensor and Indicator Applications in Smart Food Packaging

Smart food packaging based on biosensors has been attracting more and more interest to the industrial community because of the concerns of food quality and safety. A food packaging with biosensor has a scope to enable real-time monitoring of microbial breakdown products of packaged foods. Furthermore, one of the biggest challenges in implementing biosensor for smart packaging materials is the development of bio-sensing active materials that can leverage their electrical, thermal, biodegradable and other functional properties. In this regard, nanocellulose-based activated carbon (NAC) nanocomposite was developed using the activated carbon and nanocellulose gel using the casting method with their different concentrations (15% to 50% of nanocellulose corresponding to 85% to 50% activated carbon). The developed NAC nanocomposites were electrically tested via cyclic voltammetry and results showed that 30% NAC nanocomposite consisted of good electrical properties compared to 30 and 50% of NAC nanocomposite for biosensor developments. Metal nanoparticle enriched natural biopolymer has attained significant attention in the research community, because they can create high specific surface area, adsorption capability, and gas sensing properties into polymer composite or nanocomposites. Different contents of AgNPs with 10-500 ppm were synthesized with 30% NAC nanocomposite and optimized their electrical properties. The results showed that AgNPs/NAC nanocomposite with optimum 450 ppm of AgNPs contained the good electrical properties for biosensor development. The biosensor developed with optimized AgNPs/NAC nanocomposite resulted in good sensitivity and selectivity to detect microbial breakdown products as a spoilage indicator. Ammonia (NH3) is one of the microbial breakdown products that released from protein rich food products (such as meat, fish, sea foods etc.) and had a good response in monitoring meat spoilage. The developed biosensor was utilized to monitor NH3, and the sensor showed good sensitivity over the range of 5-100 ppm and selectivity to detect the NH3. Biochar is one of the carbon-based materials that belongs a high specific surface area, highly porous structure, good stability, and cost-effectiveness over other carbon items (single or multi carbon nanotubes and graphene). The activated biochar (ABC)-based composite was developed with different ABC and polylactic acid (PLA) levels and the electrical properties of the developed ABC/PLA composite was determined via cyclic and differential voltammograms (CV and DPV). The results showed that 85% ABC/PLA composite has a good electrical property for biosensor development. To improve the gas sensing properties, 85% ABC/PLA composite was further synthesized with 450 ppm of AgNPs (v/v) and casted AgNPs/ABC/PLA nanocomposite. The biosensor was developed with casted AgNPs/ABC/PLA nanocomposite and tested for ammonia over the range of 5-60 ppm. The results revealed that the sensitivity of the developed biosensor increased as the concentrations of NH3 increased over the range of 5-60 ppm. An indicator with food packaging has the ability to monitor microbial contaminations in food products. A color indicator film was developed by a film casting method using an ultrasonic suspension of nanocellulose/chitosan blends doped with methyl red synthesis followed by PLA coating (named PLA/NCM film). The color modulation of the PLA/NCM films was processed via the colorimetric device and revealed considerable color changes (ΔEs) dependent on the meat spoilage. The PLA/NCM film changed its color upon exposure to different pH buffer solutions (2−10). The total viable microbial counts (TVC) and pH of the beef sample were determined, and the findings showed that the TVC and pH increased simultaneously depending on the state of the beef spoilage

Sensors for foetal hypoxia and metabolic acidosis: a review

This article reviews existing clinical practices and sensor research undertaken to monitor fetal well-being during labour. Current clinical practices that include fetal heart rate monitoring and fetal scalp blood sampling are shown to be either inadequate or time-consuming. Monitoring of lactate in blood is identified as a potential alternative for intrapartum fetal monitoring due to its ability to distinguish between different types of acidosis. A literature review from a medical and technical perspective is presented to identify the current advancements in the field of lactate sensors for this application. It is concluded that a less invasive and a more continuous monitoring device is required to fulfill the clinical needs of intrapartum fetal monitoring. Potential specifications for such a system are also presented in this paper

Application of electro-active biofilms

The concept of an electro-active biofilm (EAB) has recently emerged from a few studies that discovered that certain bacteria which form biofilms on conductive materials can achieve a direct electrochemical connection with the electrode surface using it as electron exchanger, without the aid of mediators. This electro-catalytic property of biofilms has been clearly related to the presence of some specific strains that are able to exchange electrons with solid substrata (eg Geobacter sulfurreducens and Rhodoferax ferrireducens). EABs can be obtained principally from natural sites such as soils or seawater and freshwater sediments or from samples collected from a wide range of different microbially rich environments (sewage sludge, activated sludge, or industrial and domestic effluents). The capability of some microorganisms to connect their metabolisms directly in an external electrical power supply is very exciting and extensive research is in progress on exploring the possibilities of EABs applications. Indeed, the best known application is probably the microbial fuel cell technology that is capable of turning biomass into electrical energy. Nevertheless, EABs coated onto electrodes have recently become popular in other fields like bioremediation, biosynthesis processes, biosensor design, and biohydrogen production