Characterization of Cultivar Differences of Blueberry Wines Using GC-QTOF-MS and Metabolic Profiling Methods.

Fang Yuan,Ke Cheng,Jihui Gao,Siyi Pan

doi:10.3390/molecules23092376

Abstract

A non-targeted volatile metabolomic approach based on the gas chromatography-quadrupole time of fight-mass spectrometry (GC-QTOF-MS) coupled with two different sample extraction techniques (solid phase extraction and solid phase microextraction) was developed. Combined mass spectra of blueberry wine samples, which originated from two different cultivars, were subjected to orthogonal partial least squares-discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA). Principal component analysis (PCA) reveals an excellent separation and OPLS-DA highlight metabolic features responsible for the separation. Metabolic features responsible for the observed separation were tentatively assigned to phenylethyl alcohol, cinnamyl alcohol, benzenepropanol, 3-hydroxy-benzenethanol, methyl eugenol, methyl isoeugenol, (E)-asarone, (Z)-asarone, and terpenes. Several of the selected markers enabled a distinction in secondary metabolism to be drawn between two blueberry cultivars. It highlights the metabolomic approaches to find out the influence of blueberry cultivar on a volatile composition in a complex blueberry wine matrix. The distinction in secondary metabolism indicated a possible O-methyltransferases activity difference among the two cultivars.

Highlights

Blueberries are known to be a potential source of natural antioxidants such as anthocyanins [1]and phenolics [2], and have demonstrated a broad spectrum of biomedical functions [3,4,5]
In the present study, we developed a non-targeted volatile metabolomic approaches based on the GC-QTOF-MS coupled with two different sample extraction techniques (SPE and solid phase microextraction (SPME)), followed by multivariate statistics, to study the difference of cultivar volatile metabolites in wines made from two southern highbush blueberry cultivars—“Misty” and “O’Neal”, grown in central China
SPME showed good sensitivity when coupled with GC-QTOF-MS, as the peaks were saturated in splitless mode in our preliminary tests

Summary

Introduction

Blueberries are known to be a potential source of natural antioxidants such as anthocyanins [1]and phenolics [2], and have demonstrated a broad spectrum of biomedical functions [3,4,5]. Blueberries are known to be a potential source of natural antioxidants such as anthocyanins [1]. Blueberries are widely grown around the world, and their production in China has grown every year since being introduced from United States in 1989 [6]. Blueberry wine is a berry fruit wine that has dark red color, pleasant blueberry aroma, and may have a multitude of health benefits [7,8]. Not as famous as grape wine, blueberry wine is quickly growing in popularity. The production process closely mimics that of both red and white wines. The health-enhancing antioxidants, total phenols, anthocyanins, and flavonoids in blueberry wines as well as in blueberry wine pomace have been widely reported [7,8,9,10]

Methods

Results

Conclusion