DESIGN SCIENCE

Food Packaging Innovation

Effects on the meat supply chain for implementation of biosensors

and

An experimental report on conductive biosensors

Malin Göransson

Abstract Food production, especially meat production, has a large impact on the environment

and wastage of these products has an even greater impact (WRAP 2007). A lot of food is

thrown away due to “safety scares” and consumers insecurity of the safety and quality

of the food. If the microbiological state of meat can be identified and constantly

updated, throughout the whole supply chain, including households, the quality of the

meat can be guaranteed. This possibility can create a new and deeper trust between the

distributers and the consumers and thereby lead to a reduced food waste.

This master thesis consists of two parts:

Effects on the meat supply chain for implementation of biosensors The first part of this master thesis perspicuously investigates advantages with an

implementation of a biosensor for the consumers and actors in a meat supply chain. The

disadvantages for implementing a biosensor have also been considered, however only

perspicuously. The analysis was based on a framework of reference including the

structure of minced meat supply chain, meat packaging, the meat itself and microbial

determination methods including biosensors. The critical points throughout the meat

supply chain were identified in order to find the most important features of the

biosensor. The results from the analysis showed that most significant advantages

involved the consumer usability and the consumer trust.

The biosensor can communicate the products microbial state with all the actors in the

supply chain including consumers, which makes sensor unique from other sensors on

today’s market. If the overall awareness of food waste problems is increased the

implementation of the biosensor could lead to a decreased waste of perfectly fine

minced meat.

The biosensor can reduce the consumers “safety scares” which indirectly create a deeper trust to the retailer cooperation and manufacturing brand. The biosensor will also add value to the consumer packed minced meat which is favorable for the promotion of sales. The biosensor can be used as a part of the self-monitoring system for every actor in the

supply chain. The biosensor can also be used to increases the transparency in the supply

chain by communicating the microbial state of the meat. Lost or distorted information

about handling and storage conditions are hence indirectly carried within the biosensor.

Experimental report The second part of this master thesis is an experimental report including investigations

of the possible correlation between the electrical conductivity and the microbial content

in minced meat. The experimental report does also include a designing process of the

experimental working method.

The experimental work included determination of the electrical conductivity, the total

bacteria content and the intestinal Enterobacteriaceae content in minced meat in

samples collected regularly. One pre-experiment was made in order to evaluate the

method and results. Adjustments on the method were made based on the outcome of

the pre-experiment and before the experimental work were started. The minced meat

was stored at 7°C, 13°C, 22°C and 37°C for about 52 hours. Three experiments were

performed on the meat stored at 7°C and four experiments were performed on meat

stored at each of the remaining temperatures, 13°C, 22°C and 37°C. The determination

of electrical conductivity was performed with a conductivity-meter.

The results of the project indicate that it is possible to non-destructively determine and

visualize the microbiological state of minced meat. The elaborated method for

determination of conductivity and total bacterial content was executed and gave

reliable results. The data points for the experimental replicates (on each storage

temperature) corresponded well with each other, which gave indications that the

method is robust. A relationship between bacterial content and conductivity was found

and did somewhat look like the logarithmic and stationary phase of a microbial growth

curve. This can imply that there is one common relationship regardless of storage

temperature.