Search Results (6,765)

Background/Objectives: Malnutrition among older adults, particularly those in aged care, is a major contributor to morbidity and healthcare costs. Reduced visual contrast sensitivity, common with ageing and dementia, may impair the ability to distinguish food from tableware, potentially leading to decreased intake. This systematic review examined whether enhancing visual contrast in the dining environment improves dietary intake in older adults. Methods: Following PRISMA guidelines, five databases were searched from inception to March 2025. Studies were eligible if they involved adults aged ≥65 years and used visual contrast interventions (e.g., coloured tableware, lighting adjustments) aimed at improving food or fluid intake. A narrative synthesis was conducted, and study quality was assessed using the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool. Results: Of 2901 records screened, four studies (five reports) met the inclusion criteria, involving a total of 64 participants. All studies implemented visual contrast enhancements, including high-contrast dishware and environmental modifications. Most reported increases in food or liquid intake, though statistical significance varied. Some studies also evaluated mealtime behaviours, functional abilities, and food waste, with mixed findings. Methodological limitations, including small sample sizes, short interventions, and inconsistent reporting limited the strength of evidence. Conclusions: Limited and low-quality evidence suggests a possible effect of modifying the dining environment to improve visual contrast for enhancing dietary intake in older adults, with visual contrast sensitivity, particularly those with dementia. However, the evidence gap is large and remains inconclusive. Future well-powered trials with standardised interventions and outcome measures are needed to determine whether these strategies can meaningfully reduce malnutrition in aged care settings. Full article

Garlic peel is an underutilized by-product with potential as a source of phenolic compounds. This study evaluated garlic peel waste valorization using ultrasound-assisted extraction with eight natural deep eutectic solvent (NADES) formulations, compared with ethanol and water, in terms of phenolic composition, antioxidant capacity, storage stability, in vitro gastrointestinal behavior, bioaccessibility, and chemometric differentiation. Total phenolic content (TPC), antioxidant capacity, and individual phenolics were analyzed, while extract stability was monitored over 60 days at 4 °C and 25 °C. Glycerol:lactic acid (1:3) and glucose:lactic acid (1:5) exhibited the highest TPC among the NADES formulations, whereas ethanol showed stronger CUPRAC and FRAP responses. HPLC–PDA analysis revealed five flavonoids, including rutin, quercetin, two cyanidin derivatives, and one pelargonidin derivative, and seven phenolic acids, including gallic, protocatechuic, vanillic, chlorogenic, p-coumaric, ferulic, and sinapic acids. Selected NADES favored anthocyanin recovery and post-digestion retention of flavonols and hydroxycinnamic acids. Most choline chloride-based NADES enhanced TPC bioaccessibility (105–293%) compared with ethanol and water (86–126%). Storage stability depended on solvent composition and temperature, with 4 °C better preserving phenolic and antioxidant properties. Chemometric analyses confirmed solvent effects on extract composition. NADES-based extraction offers a green strategy for converting garlic peel waste into phenolic-rich functional extracts. Full article

People in the late adolescent and young adult age range contribute disproportionately to household food waste. However, research on this age group often focuses on university students or treats young adults as a homogeneous group: students in vocational education receive less research attention. Using an exploratory approach this study aims to understand the lived experiences, everyday practices and perspectives of vocational students regarding food waste. It examines how these students experience, explain, and manage food waste in their everyday lives, and how these practices are shaped by capability, opportunity, and motivation. Using the COM-B framework as an analytical lens, we analyzed interviews with 26 students and a survey amongst 188 students. We find that students frequently waste small portions of food across multiple everyday contexts. Their food practices are strongly shaped both by their dependence on the parental household and to a lesser extent by exposure to professional food-service environments through vocational education and part-time work. Hence, rather than resulting primarily from intentional disregard for sustainability, food waste often emerges from routine practices, changing schedules, convenience, and uncertainty surrounding food safety and storage. Full article

Closed-loop habitats in space-analogue and other extreme environments must sustain life and performance within tightly bounded constraints on water, energy, food, air revitalisation, waste processing, space, and crew time. Existing assessments emphasise engineering reliability, resource throughput, and human factors, but less often address everyday practices—meals, hygiene, privacy, social rituals, sensory comfort, and care work—as variables relevant to sustainability. This conceptual paper develops closed-loop hospitality as an integrated sustainability assessment framework for analysing how such practices mediate between resource constraints and environmental, social, and operational outcomes. Drawing on sustainability assessment, circular resource use, resilience, socio-technical systems, habitability, and hospitality theory, the framework links constraint variables—including resupply interval, closure ratio, bottlenecks, redundancy, volumetric capacity, crew time scarcity, intercultural crew composition, and health-support capacity—to hospitality design choices and measurable indicators. It identifies outcomes such as resource intensity, recycling and waste burden, system reliability, labour distribution, equity and legitimacy of access, psychosocial wellbeing, compliance, and adaptive resilience. The paper supports threshold setting, scorecards, and protocol design in analogue habitats, arguing that sustainable habitation requires balancing resource stewardship with minimum viable hospitality: preserving dignity, care, privacy, cohesion, and operational continuity within closed-loop limits. Full article

Household food waste remains a huge challenge for solid waste management in municipalities worldwide, especially in the Global South. Existing studies that measure food waste (FW) in cities are scarce, have limited geographic scope, and have limited timeframes. In that direction, the current investigation provides data on the FW composition of nine regions of the municipality of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), based on a three-year sampling across 155 neighborhoods. Waste samples were collected from 2021 to 2023. In total, about 24,038 kg (fresh weight) was analyzed. Results showed that FW accounts for an average of 47.7 ± 1.9% of household waste in the study period. The FW composition in the city of Rio de Janeiro ranged from 60.3–76.5% for fruits, vegetables, and salads, 15.0–25.1% for fine aggregate (small-sized food residues < 2.54 cm, like rice, beans, grains, and fragmented food particles), and 3.2–5.8% for proteins (discarded animal-based protein foods like chicken and meat). The chi-square goodness-of-fit test was applied to evaluate whether the FW composition in each of the nine regions differed from the mean FW composition of the Rio de Janeiro municipality. The findings revealed statistically significant differences (p-value < 0.05) in the average FW fractions in specific regions and years compared with the city’s average composition. Thus, one of the key takeaways of this investigation was that the percentages of discharged food waste fractions vary over time and across locations, even within the same municipality. The present research took a first step toward understanding the food waste problem in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) and underscores the importance of monitoring food waste data to guide the development of locally specific strategies for sustainable urban food systems, including waste prevention, recycling, and food recovery. Full article

Pullulan is a microbial exopolysaccharide produced primarily by Aureobasidium spp. It has attracted considerable attention due to its biodegradability, biocompatibility, and versatility in food-related applications. While its basic chemical structure has long been established, recent advances have significantly improved the understanding of the genetic, enzymatic, and regulatory mechanisms governing its biosynthesis. This review discusses current knowledge on pullulan production, focusing on biosynthetic pathways, regulatory networks, and the influence of fermentation conditions on polymer yield and quality. Particular emphasis is placed on the utilization of agro-industrial residues as renewable feedstocks within a circular bioeconomy framework, as well as on downstream recovery and purification strategies. Furthermore, the physicochemical properties of pullulan and its ability to form synergistic assemblies with other biopolymers are evaluated in relation to hydrogels, edible films, active packaging, and bioactive delivery systems. By integrating microbial biotechnology, bioprocess engineering, and material science, this review provides a comprehensive overview of pullulan-based systems for food-related applications. Full article

Although the Mediterranean diet (MD) is widely recognized as a healthy dietary pattern, its potential role as a framework for sustainable urban gastronomy has received limited attention. This narrative review synthesizes evidence from nutrition, environmental studies, gastronomy, tourism, and urban food systems. The review explores MD’s sustainability dimensions, food waste and urban food systems, cultural heritage, and trends in urban gastronomy. The findings suggest that the MD is a strong model for sustainable urban food futures, combining nutritional adequacy, relatively low environmental impact, and socio-cultural legitimacy. Evidence indicates that Mediterranean-style dietary patterns are associated with lower greenhouse gas emissions, land use, energy use, and water consumption than Western diets, while also remaining comparatively affordable when based on staple plant foods. However, important challenges remain, including affordability, especially across vulnerable social groups; dependence on local supply systems; authenticity under tourism pressure; and the need for effective governance. Overall, the evidence suggests that the MD provides a useful framework for integrating health, sustainability, and cultural heritage objectives within urban food systems. Future research should focus on city-level implementation strategies, food service and restaurant sector practices, and hotel meal planning within urban MD frameworks. Full article

According to the main principles of the circular economy, recovering bioactive compounds from food waste has significant potential to deliver financial, environmental, and health benefits by incorporating them into food products as additives, emulsifiers, antioxidants, and antimicrobial agents to enhance nutritional and functional value and/or extend product shelf life. This work investigated the potential of a food waste material, such as chickpea aquafaba from industrial processing, as a fermentation substrate using promising lactic acid bacteria, including L. plantarum AME-01, L. paracasei CBA L74, and L. mesenteroides, under non-controlled pH conditions, and evaluated the antioxidant/chelating capacity of the postbiotic obtained from the process. Fermented substrates were thermally inactivated to produce postbiotic preparations, which were characterized in terms of inactivated biomass and lactic acid concentration. Subsequently, liquid postbiotics were spray-dried using a lab-scale spray dryer, and the resulting powders were characterized in terms of antioxidant and chelating properties. While the postbiotic preparations using L. paracasei CBA L74 showed significantly lower activity (23.78 ± 7.25%) compared to non-fermented aquafaba (56.85 ± 2.79%), those using L. plantarum AME-01 (84.60 ± 5.57%) and L. mesenteroides (82.56 ± 1.11%) exhibited increased chelating activity. The antioxidant power of all fermented powders was significantly improved, confirming the potential of postbiotic ingredients as stabilizing additives in food formulations. Full article

Over a decade of research on media for cultured meat and seafood production has resulted in multiple highly efficient serum-free and chemically defined formulations for some species, but it has also identified challenges yet to be solved—especially for aquatic cell lines. Depending on the product and cell type, the approach to develop highly efficient, sustainable, and low-priced media can diverge greatly. In this review, we provide an in-depth overview of this complex research area to facilitate strategic decision-making for stakeholders. We evaluate the advantages and limitations of utilizing hydrolysates, growth factor mutants, growth factor alternatives, and stabilizers in serum-free media formulations published for cultured meat production, as well as ongoing research efforts on developing adequate media for cultured seafood. We critically analyze strategies aimed at reducing medium costs and enhancing sustainability of cultured meat and seafood production, including their food-compatibility assessment. We summarize topics that require further exploration, such as identification of species-specific growth factors—particularly for aquatic species; exploration of hydrolysates as a substitute for basal medium; waste medium recycling strategies; and the potential application of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) technologies to enhance these areas. Additionally, we consider possible emerging regulatory issues and their impact on media formulation development. Finally, key performance indicators for media formulations are proposed to guide future strategic and operational improvements regarding an economical and sustainable production process. Full article

Aerobic composting of food waste (FW) is constrained by delayed temperature increase initially. This study evaluated the use of high-solid anaerobic digestion (HSAD) biogas residue as a composting initiator. In the co-composting treatment containing biogas residue and FW (C3), the temperature peaked at 69.8 °C on day 5. In comparison, the FW composting alone (C1) reached a lower peak temperature of 67.1 °C on day 8. Similarly, C3 sustained the thermophilic phase (>55 °C) for 10 days, comparable to the 11 days observed in C1. The incorporation of biogas residue adjusted the pH of FW toward neutrality, helping to reduce nitrogen loss. C3 also demonstrated a distinctive phytohormone profile, with salicylic acid (SA) content reaching 42.62 ng g⁻¹, significantly exceeding that of C1 (31.54 ng g⁻¹), suggesting enhanced bio-stimulatory potential. Compared with C1, N₂O emissions in C3 were both reduced and delayed, while cumulative CH₄ emissions were lower than those in the biogas-residue-alone composting (C2). Biogas residue addition introduced thermotolerant microbes, reduced acidification by suppressing acidophiles, and enhanced humification via cooperative networks. Metagenomics revealed that C3 developed a denitrification gene profile favoring net N₂O consumption under high pH. These results demonstrate that HSAD biogas residue can serve as an effective initiator for FW composting. Full article

The olive oil industry generates large amounts of by-products, particularly olive pomace and olive mill wastewater, which represent valuable sources of polyphenolic compounds with well-recognized antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, and health-promoting properties. Within the framework of the circular economy, the valorization of these olive-derived residues has emerged as a promising strategy for converting low-value waste into high-added-value ingredients for food, pharmaceutical, and cosmetic applications. This review provides a comprehensive overview of recent advances in sustainable extraction and sample preparation approaches for the recovery of olive polyphenols, including ultrasound-, microwave-, enzyme-, and membrane-assisted technologies, as well as the use of green solvents and environmentally friendly extraction systems. Furthermore, the review discusses advanced analytical strategies for the identification and quantification of olive-derived polyphenols, covering chromatographic, spectrometric, electrophoretic, and miniaturized analytical platforms. Special attention is given to biopolymer-based encapsulation systems developed to enhance stability, controlled release, bioaccessibility, and bioavailability of these bioactive compounds. Finally, current challenges and future perspectives regarding the integration of green extraction technologies, analytical methodologies, and advanced delivery systems are highlighted to promote the sustainable exploitation of olive by-products within a circular economy framework. Full article

Existing anti-aging drugs are often limited by toxicity and resistance. In contrast, natural substances derived from food resources, edible plants, and agricultural by-products offer advantages such as low toxicity and suitability for dietary intake. Utilizing these resources aligns with sustainable development goals by promoting the valorization of food waste and functional food development; however, their complex composition makes traditional discovery inefficient and resource-intensive. Machine learning (ML) provides a powerful, sustainable in silico solution. By analyzing vast datasets, computational models can rapidly screen thousands of candidates, significantly reducing the chemical waste and time associated with traditional wet-lab screening. This review focuses on the current status of food-derived anti-aging bioactives and the emerging ML-based perspectives in this field. Key natural compounds and plant extracts are discussed, highlighting their dietary origins and mechanisms. Furthermore, we explore how advanced algorithms accelerate the identification of novel bioactives. Importantly, we address current translational gaps, including the need for explainable AI, ADME (Absorption, Distribution, Metabolism, and Excretion) prediction, and the standardization of complex mixtures. Overcoming these bottlenecks is essential for the sustainable development of effective, food-based anti-aging ingredients. Full article

Consumer perception and sensory satisfaction play a critical role in shaping sustainable food consumption patterns, purchase intention, and repeat purchasing behavior within modern food systems. This study evaluated the physicochemical and sensory attributes of five imported mango cultivars (Tommy Atkins, Kent, Palmer, Osteen, and Sindhri) sold in Florence, Italy, to examine how quality characteristics influence consumer acceptance and sustainable food choice behavior. Physical and chemical analyses included fruit weight, peel color, firmness, total soluble solids, titratable acidity, and pulp characteristics. Sensory evaluation was conducted using a trained panel to assess visual appearance, sweetness, sourness, aroma, juiciness, texture, pleasantness, naturalness perception, overall judgment, and purchase intention before and after consumption. Significant differences were observed among cultivars for several quality and sensory parameters. Sindhri exhibited the highest sweetness and strong consumer acceptance, while Palmer achieved the highest overall judgment and purchase intention after tasting. Kent demonstrated superior visual color and firmness attributes, whereas Tommy Atkins showed higher fibrousness and lower overall consumer acceptance. The findings demonstrate that sensory characteristics are strongly associated with consumer perceptions and purchase intentions, underscoring the importance of cultivar-specific quality profiling in sustainable food marketing strategies. Understanding consumer-oriented quality preferences may support more sustainable imported fruit supply chains by improving consumer satisfaction, reducing dissatisfaction-related food waste, and enhancing sustainable consumption patterns in the growing Italian tropical fruit market. Full article

Background: Food insecurity remains a major public health challenge in many low- and middle-income countries, where environmental and socioeconomic conditions influence household access to adequate, safe, and nutritious food. Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate the associations between environmental and socioeconomic factors and household food security in Riobamba, Ecuador. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 382 households using the Latin American and Caribbean Food Security Scale (ELCSA), complemented by structured and Likert-scale questions addressing agricultural production practices, food handling, waste management, and food choice and dietary diversity. Household food security status was classified according to the standard ELCSA scoring procedure and subsequently grouped into categories representing adequate or inadequate household food access and consumption. Binary Logit and Probit models were estimated to identify factors associated with household food security. Results: The Probit model showed slightly better predictive performance (classification accuracy = 73.56%; Pseudo R² = 0.2729; LR χ² = 143.94; p < 0.01). Household income was the strongest predictor of food security status (Logit coefficient = 1.1977; p < 0.01). Among the environmental variables, agricultural production practices (β = 0.8649; p < 0.01), food handling practices (β = 0.3714; p < 0.05), and food choice and dietary diversity (β = 0.6479; p < 0.01) were positively associated with adequate household food access and consumption, whereas waste management practices were not significantly associated. Household size and gender were also significantly associated with food security outcomes. Conclusions: These findings indicate that household food security in urban Ecuadorian settings is associated with both environmental and socioeconomic conditions. Policies promoting sustainable agricultural practices, safe food handling, dietary diversity, and socioeconomic well-being may contribute to strengthening household food security and nutrition. Full article

Intelligent food packaging (IFP) is among the key technologies for overcoming global challenges of food safety and food resource waste. Its core lies in monitoring the quality of food in real-time without damage. Sodium alginate (SA), a natural polysaccharide characterized by biodegradability and excellent biocompatibility, can form hydrogels with a 3D network structure, high water content, and functional modification capability, making it an ideal matrix for developing IFP sensing and indicator platforms. Based on the gel chemistry fundamentals of SA, this paper deeply analyzes the structure-activity relationship between sensing mechanism and material structure, and summarizes the existing modification strategies and functional integration paths. The paper also provides a detailed discussion on the application principles and latest advancements of SA-based hydrogels in colorimetric/visual sensing, gas sensing, time-temperature indicator (TTI), and controlled-release carriers for active substances. The current research results show that the detection limit of SA hydrogel beads loaded with anthocyanins for volatile amines can reach 15–25 ppm, and the color difference ΔE can reach 34.2 after 7 days of storage at 4 °C, which is strongly correlated with microbial indicators, total volatile basic nitrogen (TVB-N), pH, etc. The color difference value (ΔE) response of Co-Imd microcrystalline functionalized SA film to ammonia gas reached 23.7 within 60 min, and it had antibacterial activity. The activation energy of Immobilization of laccase on sodium alginate/soluble starch microcapsules to develop a TTI (27.32–61.13 kJ/mol) was highly matched with the activation energy of Agaricus bisporus. The hydrogel microspheres loaded with Cur@Se reduced the total oxidation value of the oils by 53%. The G/SA/nZnOs cryogel pad extended the shelf life of shrimp from 4 days to 6 days at 4 °C. In addition, this paper also discusses the challenges faced by SA-based hydrogels in large-scale production and long-term stability evaluation, and looks forward to future development trends such as integration with artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), and multi-functional integration, in order to provide theoretical support for in-depth research and industrial application in this field. Full article