Use of near infrared spectroscopy coupled with chemometrics for fast detection of irradiated dry fermented sausages

Chemometric analysis of near infrared (NIR) spectroscopy data was applied to investigate the possibility to rapidly detect dry fermented sausages treated with ionizing radiation at 0; 0,5; 1; 2 and 3 kGy. NIR spectra from 1000 to 2500 nm were subjected to an exploratory principal component analysis (PCA) followed by orthogonal partial last square-discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA) to develop classifiers able to distinguish samples according to the irradiation dose. Models provided a correct classification rate of 100% for both irradiated and non-irradiated specimens. As for the different irradiation doses, 100% of sausages treated at 1 and 3 kGy dose, 92% of those at 2 kGy and 83% of those at 0,5 kGy were correctly classified. The successful results obtained confirmed suitability of chemometric analysis applied to NIR data for fast detection of dry fermented sausages subjected to irradiation treatment.