ESTIMATE OF GAS-COMPOSITION CHANGES IN PR OTECTIVE ATMOSPHERE PACKAGING

A protective atmosphere in a flexible packaging can change its composi tion by means of gases interactions with the food components or gases diffusion through the container. Such diffusion corresponds both to pe rmeability phenomena and to unselective diffusion through leaks in the material or package. While this last phenomenon can not be Foreseen i n any way, as it is completely occasional, permeability is largely pre dictable by the diffusional properties of the materials and internal a tmosphere composition. In this work a computing procedure is proposed, which allows to predict the atmosphere evolution only on the basis of permeability phenomena, and are presented the tests that were carried out to verify its reliability. The gaschromatographic analysis of the atmosphere changes, measured in packages closed with different gas co mpositions and produced with different materials and geometry, demonst rated the effectiveness of the iterative computing procedure suggested , which could represent an useful tool for optimising the package desi gn in order to reach the best results in protective atmosphere packagi ng technology.