Origin verification of Chinese concentrated apple juice using stable isotopic and mineral elemental fingerprints coupled with chemometrics

Abstract

Verification of the origin of 116 concentrated apple juice (CAJ) samples from three production areas (BHB, SCH and LP) of China was investigated in a trial using stable isotopic (δ13C, δ18O and δD) and the contents of 26 mineral elements. Our aim was to identify and differentiate the geographical origin of these CAJ samples, and more importantly to establish a model that can be used to verify geographical origin of Chinese CAJ samples, as to date there is no such study. Combining with the multivariate statistical analyses including principal component analysis (PCA) and partial least squared-discriminant analysis (PLS-DA), the predictive models were successfully established to discriminate diverse CAJ producing areas with an accuracy rate of 93.2 %. The most important variables to discriminate CAJ of Chinese origin were turned out to be δD, Mg, Tl, δ18O, Mo, Sr, V, As, and δ13C. Therefore, the results of this first exploratory work highlight the possibility of discriminating CAJ of different provenance. This work proposes the use of combined analyses related to stable isotopes and minerals elements as markers for CAJ certification. Our study helps to fill in the gap of origin identification of CAJ in China.