Antioxidant activity enhancement of biodegradable film as active packaging utilizing crude extract from durian leaf waste

This study was conducted for the purpose of identifying the effectiveness of durian leaf extract in gelatin-based film as active packaging. The major goal was to enhance the antioxidant activity of the packaging film by incorporating durian leaf extract. Durian leaves are commonly discarded as waste in the process of pruning the tree branches along the crop production. The utilization of durian leaf has yet to be explored for the benefit of the food packaging industry. Results of the study revealed that gelatin-based film with added 0.5% crude extract of durian leaf possesses 17.6 times higher DPPH scavenging activity than the negative control sample. The film sample resulted in three times lower oxidation rate of palm oil sample in comparison with the negative control sample. This shows the efficiency of the gelatin-film with added 0.5% crude leaf extract in retarding oil oxidation. In addition to the physicochemical property improvement of the gelatin film, the mechanical property, specifically water vapor permeability of the film was also evaluated. This feature plays an important role in retaining physical condition such as weight loss and texture of fresh cut fruits that were wrapped with the packaging film. Durian fruit pulps that were tested and wrapped using the gelatin films revealed that the addition of durian leaf extract contributed insignificant (p > 0.05) improvement to the packaging film in retaining physical changes of the durian fruit pulp. It was concluded that incorporating durian leaf extract into gelatin-based film mainly improved the functional properties of the packaging film in retarding oil oxidation.