Quality Assessment of Food

Food quality is an important concept because the food people choose depends largely on quality. Food quality must be monitored on a regular day-to-day basis to ensure that a uniform product is produced and that it meets the required quality control standards. Food quality has both subjective and non subjective aspects. Appearance, texture, and flavor are largely subjective attributes, whereas nutritional and bacterial quality are not. The last two qualities can be measured objectively by chemical analysis, by measuring bacterial counts, or using other specific tests. Currently, most of the traditional measuring techniques used to determine food quality are destructive (eg, texture, firmness, total soluble solids, acidity, color score, juice content) and involve random sampling, which increases the likelihood of an incorrect evaluation. Thus, nondestructive techniques, based on aroma characteristics, can offer the possibility to optimize food quality assessments.

E-nose technology

PTR–MS

Ultrasound Technology

Hyperspectral imaging

Fluorescence excitation spectroscopy

Nanotechnology