Rapid assessment of the authenticity of limequat fruit using the electronic nose and gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry

Martyna Lubinska-Szczygeł,Tomasz Dymerski,Jacek Namieśnik,Dominika Pudlak

doi:10.1007/s00706-018-2242-7

Martyna Lubinska-Szczygeł, Tomasz Dymerski + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1007/s00706-018-2242-7

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Abstract

Citrus fruits are very popular food products. There are many species and varieties of them. There are also documented cases of some citrus fruits causing a severe allergic reaction. Some species of the citrus fruits, especially hybrid ones show a reduced allergenic effect due to the lack of seeds. There is a need for rapid methods for evaluation of citrus’ botanical origin. During research, the headspace of three citrus fruits Citrus Aurantifolia, Citrus japonica, and Citrus × floridana was analysed using electronic nose based on ultrafast gas chromatography and gas chromatography with mass spectrometry. In the paper, two approaches were compared. The usefulness of an electronic nose to control the quality of hybrids was demonstrated. The results obtained during ultrafast gas chromatography analyses were subjected to statistical analysis. Four chemometric methods namely: principal component analysis (PCA), discriminant function analysis (DFA), soft independent modeling of class analogies (SIMCA), statistical quality control (SQC) were used to distinguish between limequat and its parent fruits. Electronic nose combined with chemometrics is a novel analytical tool for hybrid fruits’ classification due to their botanical origin. It can supplement established techniques by providing results in a short time and at a low cost.Graphical abstract

Highlights

Citruses are the most popular group of fruits in the world
The headspace of three citrus fruits Citrus Aurantifolia, Citrus japonica, and Citrus 9 floridana was analysed using electronic nose based on ultrafast gas chromatography and gas chromatography with mass spectrometry
The aim of the study was to assess the usefulness of gas chromatography coupled with time-of-flight mass spectrometry and the electronic nose based on ultrafast gas chromatography to distinguish the hybrid fruit regarding their parent fruits, namely lime and kumquat

Summary

Introduction

Citruses are the most popular group of fruits in the world. Lots of them look similar and in some cases, based on visual assessment, it is not possible to recognize the fruit variety. It is sometimes hard to distinguish citruses from their parent fruit, because hybrid fruits inherit their visual characteristics. Knowledge of botanical origin is important from the point of view of potential allergies [4]. Allergens contained in citrus are among the most common factors causing allergies [5]. The content of allergens is different for various citrus fruits, which is why it is extremely important to know the botanical origin of the fruit. The most allergenic factor in citrus is their seeds, which contain numerous IgE reactive proteins [6]. Citrus hybrids are often seedless, their reduced potency of the allergenic effect

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