NMR Applications in Food Analysis

A special issue of Foods (ISSN 2304-8158). This special issue belongs to the section "Food Analytical Methods".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 May 2023) | Viewed by 7286

Special Issue Editors


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Soft Matter Spectroscopy Laboratory, Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, University of Pisa, Via Giuseppe Moruzzi, 13 - 56124 Pisa, Italy
Interests: soft matter; NMR; food; spectroscopy; chemical-physical characterization
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Jozef Stefan Institute, Ljubljana, Slovenia
Interests: solid-state physics; NMR relaxometry; molecular dynamics; artificial intelligence
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Guest Editor
Department of Food Engineering, Middle East Technical University (METU), Ankara 06800, Turkey
Interests: Time Domain NMR; confectionery science; food powders; functional foods
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is a versatile spectroscopy technique that has seen a rich variety of applications in physics, chemistry, materials science, medicine, and food science. In particular, several NMR methods, developed to investigate either foods without any chemical or physical treatments or food extracts, allow different types of characterization of foods and agricultural products. High-resolution NMR (HR NMR) and quantitative NMR (qNMR) techniques provide insight into the chemical composition of plant and animal tissue, packaging materials, food products and food derivatives, and they are usually combined with multivariate statistical analysis to study large sets of samples, to characterize the metabolomic profiles of food, and to identify adulterations and frauds. Time domain NMR (TD NMR) and low-resolution NMR (LR NMR) techniques are easy to use, thus making NMR an affordable technique for assessing food quality. TD NMR measurements provide valuable information on the physical properties (moisture/oil contents, hydration, gelling, amorphous/crystallinity) of foods, and with the availability of benchtop instruments, it has become much more readily available. Fast field-cycling (FFC) relaxometry has also been growing in popularity among food scientists due to the availability of table-top setups. FFC relaxometry allows the measurement of spin-lattice relaxation times over a broad range of Larmor frequencies, which provides insight into molecular dynamics, for example to distinguish the liquid and solid content in foods or to study water mobility in gels. 

In this Special Issue of Foods, we encourage manuscripts that explore different applications of NMR in food analysis. These include novel NMR approaches, studies of food quality assessment, and uses of NMR to detect possible food adulteration.

Prof. Dr. Valentina Domenici
Dr. Anton Gradisek
Dr. Mecit H. Oztop
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • NMR methods
  • food adulterations
  • NMR relaxometry
  • high-resolution NMR
  • food quality assessment
  • foodomics
  • food characterization
  • quantitative NMR
  • time domain NMR
  • fast field-cycling NMR

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

11 pages, 1977 KiB  
Article
Quantitation of L-cystine in Food Supplements and Additives Using 1H qNMR: Method Development and Application
by Zhen Chen, Xiaofang Lian, Meichen Zhou, Xiuli Zhang and Cong Wang
Foods 2023, 12(12), 2421; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/foods12122421 - 20 Jun 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1797
Abstract
Cystine-enriched food supplements are increasingly popular due to their beneficial health effects. However, the lack of industry standards and market regulations resulted in quality issues with cystine food products, including cases of food adulteration and fraud. This study established a reliable and practical [...] Read more.
Cystine-enriched food supplements are increasingly popular due to their beneficial health effects. However, the lack of industry standards and market regulations resulted in quality issues with cystine food products, including cases of food adulteration and fraud. This study established a reliable and practical method for determining cystine in food supplements and additives using quantitative NMR (qNMR). With the optimized testing solvent, acquisition time, and relaxation delay, the method exhibited higher sensitivity, precision, and reproducibility than the conventional titrimetric method. Additionally, it was more straightforward and more economical than HPLC and LC-MS. Furthermore, the current qNMR method was applied to investigate different food supplements and additives regarding cystine quantity. As a result, four of eight food supplement samples were found to be inaccurately labeled or even with fake labeling, with the relative actual amount of cystine ranging from 0.3% to 107.2%. In comparison, all three food additive samples exhibited satisfactory quality (the relative actual amount of cystine: 97.0–99.9%). Notably, there was no obvious correlation between the quantifiable properties (price and labeled cystine amount) of the tested food supplement samples and their relative actual amount of cystine. The newly developed qNMR-based approach and the subsequent findings might help standardization and regulation of the cystine supplement market. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue NMR Applications in Food Analysis)
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27 pages, 4065 KiB  
Article
Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopic Analysis of the Evolution of Peroxidation Products Arising from Culinary Oils Exposed to Thermal Oxidation: An Investigation Employing 1H and 1H-1H COSY and TOCSY Techniques
by Gilbert Ampem, Adam Le Gresley, Martin Grootveld and Declan P. Naughton
Foods 2022, 11(13), 1864; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/foods11131864 - 24 Jun 2022
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1589
Abstract
Scientific warnings on the deleterious health effects exerted by dietary lipid oxidation products (LOPs) present in thermally stressed culinary oils have, to date, not received adequate attention given that there has been an increase in the use and consumption of such oil products [...] Read more.
Scientific warnings on the deleterious health effects exerted by dietary lipid oxidation products (LOPs) present in thermally stressed culinary oils have, to date, not received adequate attention given that there has been an increase in the use and consumption of such oil products in everyday life. In this study, high-resolution 1H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) analysis was used to characterize and map chemical modifications to fatty acid (FA) acyl groups and the evolution of LOPs in saturated fatty acid (SFA)-rich ghee, monounsaturated fatty acid (MUFA)-rich groundnut, extra virgin olive, and macadamia oils, along with polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA)-rich sesame, corn and walnut oils, which were all thermally stressed at 180 °C, continuously and discontinuously for 300 and 480 min, respectively. Results acquired revealed that PUFA-rich culinary oils were more susceptible to thermo-oxidative stress than the others tested, as expected. However, ghee and macadamia oil both generated only low levels of toxic LOPs, and these results demonstrated a striking similarity. Furthermore, at the 120 min thermo-oxidation time-point, the discontinuous thermo-oxidation episodes produced higher concentrations of aldehydic LOPs than those produced during continuous thermo-oxidation sessions for the same duration. On completion of the thermo-oxidation period, a higher level of triacylglycerol chain degradation, and hence, higher concentrations of aldehydes, were registered in culinary oils thermally stressed continuously over those found in discontinuous thermo-oxidized oils. These findings may be crucial in setting targets and developing scientific methods for the suppression of LOPs in thermo-oxidized oils. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue NMR Applications in Food Analysis)
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11 pages, 1207 KiB  
Article
Investigation of the Hydration Behavior of Different Sugars by Time Domain-NMR
by Ozan Tas, Ulku Ertugrul, Leonid Grunin and Mecit Halil Oztop
Foods 2022, 11(8), 1148; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/foods11081148 - 15 Apr 2022
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2828
Abstract
The hydration behavior of sugars varies from each other and examining the underlying mechanism is challenging. In this study, the hydration behavior of glucose, fructose, allulose (aka rare sugar), and sucrose have been explored using different Time Domain Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (TD-NMR) approaches [...] Read more.
The hydration behavior of sugars varies from each other and examining the underlying mechanism is challenging. In this study, the hydration behavior of glucose, fructose, allulose (aka rare sugar), and sucrose have been explored using different Time Domain Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (TD-NMR) approaches (relaxation times, self-diffusion, and Magic Sandwich Echo (MSE)). For that purpose, the effects of different sugar concentrations (2.5%, 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, 30%, and 40%) (w/v) and hydration at different times for 1 day were investigated by T2 relaxation times and self-diffusion coefficients. Crystallinity values of the solid and hydrated sugars were also determined with MSE. Change in T2 relaxation times with concentration showed that the fastest binding with water (parallel with the shortest T2 values) was observed for sucrose for all concentrations followed by glucose, fructose, and allulose. Furthermore, dependency of T2 relaxation times with hydration time showed that sucrose was the fastest in binding with water followed by glucose, fructose, and allulose. The study showed that allulose, one of the most famous rare sugars that is known to be a natural low-calorie sugar alternative, had the lowest interaction with water than the other sugars. TD-NMR was suggested as a practical, quick, and accurate technique to determine the hydration behavior of sugars. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue NMR Applications in Food Analysis)
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