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There is an increasing market of mildly processed chilled Not-From-Concentrate (NFC) orange juices, preserved by methods such as high pressure processing (HPP) and pulsed electric fields (PEF).

To protect consumers from food fraud, analytical methods to differentiate such juices from thermally pasteurized juices are required.

This paper (open access) sought to identify volatile chemical markers specific to the preservation process.  To screen for appropriate candidate markers, the authors applied a complementary non-targeted volatilomics and sensomics approach.  This identified 58 candidate markers, among which 20 were quantitated and nine were statistically confirmed.

Extension of the quantitations to stored and doubly-treated juices finally resulted in the identification of (S)-carvone and vanillin as promising candidate markers. In combination, the two compounds could distinguish the HPP-treated juice from thermally treated juices and could even identify an HPP-treated juice that had received an additional thermal pasteurization.

Photo by ABHISHEK HAJARE on Unsplash

The authors of this paper (open access) used Fourier-Transform Ion-Cyclotron Resonance Mass Spectrometry (FT-ICR) to accurately profile and classify thousands of chemical components within different types of coffee.  They are making their list of components publicly available alongside the paper.

Their reference set of 130 coffees were purchased at market, rather than being of traceable origin, but were verified by documentation from the manufacturers along with morphological examination and classification using the German standard NMR method.

From this list of markers, the authors investigated those with the potential to discriminate based on the complex Maillard reactions of roasting processes and those that could discriminate coffee varieties.  They propose a group of 25 tryptophan conjugates of hydroxycinnamic acids that could be measured by conventional high-resolution LC-MS and used as specific markers for rustica coffee vs arabica.