Renewable and biodegradable materials have attracted broad attention as alternatives to existing conventional plastics, which have caused serious environmental problems. Collagen is a potential material for developing versatile film due to its biosafety, renewability, and biodegradability. However, it is still critical to overcome the low mechanical, antibacterial and antioxidant properties of the collagen film for food packaging applications. To address these limitations, we developed a new technology to prepare composite film by using collagen and fungal-modified APL (alkali pretreatment liquor). In this study, five edible and medical fungi, Cunninghamella echinulata FR3, Pleurotus ostreatus BP3, Ganoderma lucidum EN2, Schizophyllum commune DS1 and Xylariaceae sp. XY were used to modify the APL, and that showed that the modified APL significantly improved the mechanical, antibacterial and antioxidant properties of APL/Collagen composite films. Particularly, the APL modified by BP3, EN2 and XY showed preferable performance in enhancing the properties of the composite films. The tensile strength of the film was increased by 1.5-fold in the presence of the APL modified by EN2. To further understand the effect of fungal-biomodified APL on the properties of the composite films, a correlation analysis between the components of APL and the properties of composite films was conducted and indicated that the content of aromatic functional groups and lignin had a positive correlation with the enhanced mechanical and antioxidant properties of the composite films. In summary, composite films prepared from collagen and fungal biomodified APL showed elevated mechanical, antibacterial and antioxidant properties, and the herein-reported novel technology prospectively possesses great potential application in the food packaging industry.
Keywords: collagen; composite films; fungal modification; lignin.