many cases, food deterioration is caused by oxidation of food constituents or spoilage by moulds in the presence of O2. Although O2-sensitive foods can be packaged appropriately using modi®ed atmosphere packaging (MAP) or vacuum packaging, these technologies do not always remove O2 completely. Moreover,the O2 that permeates through the packaging cannot be removed by these techniques. By use of an O2-scavenger, which absorbs the residual O2 after
packaging, quality changes of O2-sensitive foods can often be minimized. In general, existing O2-scavenging technologies utilize one or more of the following concepts:iron powder oxidation, ascorbic acid oxidation, photosensitive dye oxidation, enzymatic oxidation (e.g. glucose oxidase and alcohol oxidase), unsaturated fatty acids(e.g. oleic acid or linolenic acid), immobilized yeast on a solid material [1].The majority of currently commercially available O2-scavengers are based on the principle of iron oxidation