Abstract
Oxygen‐sensitive foods are frequently packaged under vacuum or with inert‐gas flushing. This paper describes a method for oxygen removal from air headspaces in transparent packs by a singlet oxygen reaction in a polymer film. Illumination of a package enclosing a coiled film containing a photosensitising dye and a singlet oxygen acceptor resulted in rapid scavenging of oxygen from the headspace. The results show that the oxygen content of plastic pouches containing air (30 ml) was reduced from 21% to 1% by 6 min illumination. The scavenging rate depended on the light intensity, and the rate of oxygen diffusion into the polymer.

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