Potential Danger of UV-Inks when Printing Packaging for Food and Pharmaceutical Products

Abstract

The article is devoted to the problem of the potential danger of UV-inks with radical mechanism of photoinitiated polymerization during printing and operation of packages for food and pharmaceutical products. Pointing to the high level of environmental friendliness of the technology the use of UV-inks, which do not contain volatile organic solvents, their problem is noted application due to the possible migration of components from the ink layer and accordingly the risk of product contamination during packaging. An analysis of the processes occurring during the reaction was carried out radical polymerization, the reasons for the migration of printing ink components and by-products as a result of undergoing photoinitiated polymerization in aerobic conditions Accordingly, small amounts of unreacted components remain embedded in a three-dimensional polymer mesh and constitute the bulk of those components which can freely diffuse from the ink layer. The factors as the reason were analyzed refusal to use some types of oligomers, monomers and photoinitiators for the creation photopolymerizable ink compositions. Unreacted component residues, diffusing and mixing, depending on the chemical structure, can have a toxic or carcinogenic effect on living organisms. The analysis made it possible to classify ways of minimizing migration components of UV-inks when printing packages, namely, ways to minimize migration. The properties of UV-inks components can be divided into two types: chemical and physical. At the chemical method is a careful selection of UV-inks components and introduction synergists, and in the case of physical - compliance with technological regimes, reduction the concentration of oxygen both in the atmosphere and in the liquid composition by creating an inert gas environment and the creation of effective barriers by lamination.