Published in Scientific Bulletin. Series F. Biotechnologies, Vol. XXVIII, Issue 1
Written by Carmen Mihaela TOPALA, Sorin Ionut PRITA, Loredana Elena VIJAN
Honey is one of the most valuable natural product used for thousands of years in human nutrition. The quality of honey must be controlled analytically with the aim of preserving the consumer from commercial speculation. The values of the physicochemical parameters for ten commercial honey samples attest that all samples appeared to conform to the European Legislation. However, food products such as honey are easily adulterated both in domestic and foreign trade. An alternate analytical technique used to detect adulterations and authenticity of honey implies both FTIR spectrum screening and multivariate analysis of samples. The spectral data of ten honey samples were acquired in the range of 4000–400 cm-1. Out of them, there were two adulterant materials. A spectral range of 1800 to 650 cm−1 was selected in order to achieve a satisfactory cluster discrimination. Based on spectral variations, cluster analysis may also be used to categorize and differentiate between pure and contaminated honey.
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