An overview of natural antimicrobials role in food

The present paper aims to review the natural food preservatives with antimicrobial properties emphasizing their importance for the future of food manufacturing and consumers' health. The extraction procedures applied to natural antimicrobials will be considered, followed by the description of some natural preservatives' antimicrobial mechanism of action, including (i) membrane rupture with ATP-ase activity inhibition, (ii) leakage of essential biomolecules from the cell, (iii) disruption of the proton motive force and (iiii) enzyme inactivation. Moreover, a provenance-based classification of natural antimicrobials is discussed by considering the sources of origin for the major natural prese…