Nano-silver: Post-COVID Usage in the Dairy Industry

Post-COVID era might mark the venture of Nano-silver in the Dairy Industry. Silver has been used for its antibacterial and antiviral properties for hundreds of years.

Modern researches have claimed it but somehow the utilization remains unexploited due to the recent advances in nanotechnology. Simply putting silver coins within the milk containers perhaps was strategically overlooked.

 Nano-silver Qualities

1. High efficacious
2. Fast-acting
3. Non-poisonous
4. Non-stimulating
5. Non-allergic
6. Tolerance free
7. Hydrophilic

The application of Nano-silver products within the milk cans, antimicrobial milk packaging for storage, transportation, and processing may be a potential answer to the large economic losses at the spoilage of pasteurized milk.

India is the largest producer and consumer of milk within the world; plenty of milk are produced annually by rural farmers in India, yet a big portion of this is often lost.

Thousands of gallons of milk are poured down the drain annually. One in six pints of milk thrown away annually. Study shows about 55 million tonnes are lost before they even reach the store – during production and distribution – thanks to spoilage and wastage produced during milking and when the milk is being distributed and exported abroad.

For the Dairy Industry, it is the possible up-coming new brand that we can simply name as “Silver fortified milk”!

Any Adverse-Effect?

The no-observed-adverse-effect level (NOAEL) for silver is about 10 Gms. Over an entire lifetime oral intake for humans.  The utilization is comparatively user friendly and any potential risk is often addressed. Silver zeolite is the silver-containing compound being employed in food packaging.

Silver nanoparticles control bacterial growth whether the duration of treatment is 1 sec, 1 hour, or 10 hours!

Saves You Energy

Even at a coffee dosage, it complements the cooling chain and thermal processes. Thus saves energy in the pasteurization process.

Action and Salient Points of Nano-silver

The utilization of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) is advantageous due to the relatively large area of the small-sized particles, which facilitate the discharge of more silver ions compared to larger silver particles (>100 nm). This increases antimicrobial efficiency while requiring less material in terms of dosage. The discharge of the silver ions also depends on the size and shape of the AgNPs which is ensured in our proprietary process.

Silver is antimicrobial and is active in its ionized form (Ag+), which interacts with bases of DNA (DNA) and accordingly inhibits replication. Ag+ can react with nucleophile amino alkaloid acid residues in proteins and fasten to sulfhydryl, amino, imidazole, phosphate and carboxyl groups, resulting in protein denaturation and eventually loss of functionality and ensures the bacteria damage.

Also, these bacteria are killed because these particles help produce reactive oxygen species from air or water, which are toxic to the microbes. For all microorganisms (TAC, coliforms, yeasts and molds, E. coli, and Staph. aureus), the absolute best counts are reportedly found on top of things samples, followed by an initial load, AgNP100, and pasteurized samples, indicating that AgNP inhibited microbial growth.

So would you add ‘silver’ in your milk and drink the ‘silver-fortified’ milk? Let us know.

Read more about who needs salt when you have electricity !!!

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KRIPALIGUPTA01

B.Tech student at NIFTEM under Ministry of Food Processing Industries(MoFPI), Govt of India
Want to lead and inspire the world under the guidance of great mentors