Safe and hygienic food is a requirement for a healthy society. The problem of food-borne outbreaks has built a challenge against the food and health regulatory authorities to control the pathogenic microorganisms. Chemical preservative has created some health problems in foods, so the recent trend is towards the use of natural antimicrobials in foods. Plants are valuable source of bioactive molecules exhibiting antimicrobial activities. The plant antimicrobial compounds have diverse chemical nature such as alkaloids, phenolics, terpenes, terpenoids, flavonoids, essential oil, etc. Many plant antimicrobials possess antimicrobial activity against pathogens and spoilage microorganisms. But variation in effectiveness of these compounds against microorganisms in laboratory system and in real food systems is major determinant in their food use. Several plant extract or purified compounds are part of human diet since thousands of years. Although some plant compounds enjoy the status of generally recognised as safe (GRAS), typical toxicological information of their use in food is not available. So the improvement in cost-effective isolation and toxicological information of these compounds is helpful in their use as biopreservative in foods.
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Romika Dhiman and Neeraj Kumar Aggarwal (March 25th 2019). Efficacy of Plant Antimicrobials as Preservative in Food, Food Preservation and Waste Exploitation, Sonia A. Socaci, Anca C. F?rca?, Thierry Aussenac and Jean-Claude Laguerre, IntechOpen, DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.83440. Available from: Efficacy of Plant Antimicrobials as Preservative in Food | IntechOpen