Biomimetic hydrogels in food systems: Fabrication, properties, and applications in bioactive delivery, smart packaging, and texture engineering.

Abstract

Food science is undergoing a transformative shift toward precision material engineering, with biomimetic hydrogels emerging. Biomimetic hydrogels are defined in this review as hydrated polymer networks deliberately designed to reproduce a specific biological structure, function, or adaptive response relevant to food systems. These soft materials emulate biological tissues by integrating biocompatibility, stimuli responsiveness, and tunable textures, offering innovative solutions for functional food applications. This review presents the latest fabrication processes and key characteristics of natural biomimetic hydrogels derived from polysaccharides, proteins, and other raw materials, alongside their biomimetic inspiration and the significance of hydrogel design across diverse applications including bioactive delivery, smart packaging, dysphagia-friendly foods, and fat replacement. However, most reported systems remain at the laboratory scale, and many food applications are inferred from biomedical concepts rather than directly validated in complex food matrices. Key bottlenecks hindering their industrial translation include the softness-stability trade-off, limited scalability, incomplete sensory and processing evaluation frameworks, and uncertainties regarding the long-term safety of cross-linkers, nano-additives, and degradation products. Future research should therefore prioritize food-grade material design, systematic validation under realistic processing and storage conditions, establishment of standardized safety assessment protocols, and direct benchmarking against conventional food technologies.