Detection and characterization of small-sized microplastics (≥ 5 µm) in milk products.

Microplastics (MPs) have gained a high degree of public interest since they are associated with the global release of plastics into the environment. Various studies have confirmed the presence of MPs throughout the food chain. However, information on the ingestion of MPs via the consumption of many commonly consumed foods like dairy products are scarce due to the lack of studies investigating the "contamination" of this food group by MPs.

Identification of water-conditioned Pseudomonas aeruginosa by Raman microspectroscopy on a single cell level.

The identification of Pseudomonas aeruginosa from samples of bottled natural mineral water by the analysis of subcultures is time consuming and other species of the authentic Pseudomonas group can be a problem. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the influence of different aquatic environmental conditions (pH, mineral content) and growth phases on the cultivation-free differentiation between water-conditioned Pseudomonas spp. by applying Raman microspectroscopy.

Developing a rapid and sensitive method for determination of trans-fatty acids in edible oils using middle-infrared spectroscopy.

Several countries have adopted labelling policy concerning the declaration of trans fatty acids (TFAs) content in the nutritional facts panel of processed food. Consequently, the food industry requires rapid methods to measure low levels of TFAs. This paper reports the development of a rapid method to determine TFAs <1% in edible oils (palm, peanut, soybean and sunflower) and oils/fat samples extracted from finished products using attenuated total reflection-Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR).

Raman spectroscopic determination of norbixin and tartrazine in sugar.

In this paper, a method for the detection of norbixin and tartrazine in sugar by means of resonance Raman spectroscopy is presented. The extraction was done in four steps using methanol and the measurements were performed in aqueous solution. The excitation wavelength was 514 nm for norbixin and 488 nm for tartrazine samples.

Evaluation of Colloids and Activation Agents for Determination of Melamine Using UV-SERS.

UV-SERS measurements offer a great potential for environmental or food (detection of food contaminats) analytics. Here, the UV-SERS enhancement potential of various kinds of metal colloids, such as Pd, Pt, Au, Ag, Au-Ag core-shell, and Ag-Au core-shell with different shapes and sizes, were studied using melamine as a test molecule. The influence of different activation (KF, KCl, KBr, K(2)SO(4)) agents onto the SERS activity of the nanomaterials was investigated, showing that the combination of a particular nanoparticle with a special activation agent is extremely crucial for the observed SERS enhancement.

Rapid determination of sucrose in chocolate mass using near infrared spectroscopy.

This paper reports the results of a rapid method to determine sucrose in chocolate mass using near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). We applied a broad-based calibration approach, which consists in putting together in one single calibration samples of various types of chocolate mass. This approach increases the concentration range for one or more compositional parameters, improves the model performance and requires just one calibration model for several recipes.