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Advisor(s)
Abstract(s)
Fresh-cut fruits have become an important food market segment due to increasing demand for
fresh, healthy and convenient foods. However, processing fruits promotes a decrease in its
stability with a faster physiological deterioration, biochemical changes and microbial
degradation. Recently, food stability is strongly attributed to molecular dynamics and “water
availability”. Understanding cooperatively changes in location and mobility of water is
particularly important, considering that water dynamics profoundly influences physicochemical
and microbiological quality of foods.
The aim of this study was to use nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) as a tool to
evaluate storage fresh-cut fruit quality. Recently, NMR has evolved to become a powerful
methodology to probe the molecular dynamics of food constituents, which in turns is a
fundamental parameter to determine the dynamic properties of food components and
contributes to food degradation reactions comprehension.
In this work fresh-cut pear transverse relaxation time (T2) was measured for a period of 7 days
of storage at 5 °C. The relationship between the obtained values, microstructure and quality
parameters was investigated. In general, results show the existence of one class of water
fluidity in the system, the one present in cells after processing. T2, a measure of this fluidity, is
affected by the processing and storage time. Also, it is possible to find a relationships between
T2 and the quality parameters: total colour difference (TCD), firmness and aw. T2 increases
with aw, while it decreases with TCD and firmness.
These results highlight the usefulness of NMR methodology application in food science
Description
Keywords
Molecular mobility Quality parameters Storage Wounding Fresh-cut pear
Pedagogical Context
Citation
FUNDO, Joana … [et al.] - Fresh-cut pear quality during storage: a NMR study of water transverse relaxation time. In Congress on Food Structure Design, 1st, Porto, Portugal, 15-17 October, 2014. VICENTE, A. A. ; SILVA, C. L. M. ; PIAZZA, L. (eds.) - Book of Abstracts of the 1st Congress on Food Structure Design. Braga: Universidade do Minho, Departamento de Engenharia Biológica, 2014. ISBN 978-989-97478-5-2. p. 164
Publisher
Universidade do Minho. Departamento de Engenharia Biológica