A Smart Food Label Utilizing Roll-to-Roll Gravure Printed NFC Antenna and Thermistor to Replace Existing “Use-By” Date System

The current system of assessing food quality via “use-by” dates needs to be replaced by a real-time assessment to prevent blind disposal of consumable food products. Time-temperature history (TTH) based wireless food label, which can wirelessly provide real-time food safety information to the consumer via smartphone, is a viable alternative to the “use-by” dates. However, the cost of wireless TTH-food label has been a major bottleneck in their universal application, especially regarding low-cost, large-quantity products. In addition, such labels should be robust enough to combat external debilitating factors associated with the cold chain system. To overcome these issues, a roll-to-roll (R2R) gravure was exploited to continuously print the wireless TTH-food label platform, in which an NFC antenna and thermistor were realized via all-R2R gravure printing. Then, a Si-chip transponder with an inbuilt microcontroller and R2R printed battery were simply bridged. The resulting wireless TTH-food label thus demonstrated a real-time quality assessment by examining the growth level of foodborne pathogens computed via wirelessly transmitted TTH data to the big data server system.