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Using volatile compounds for the identification of coffee adulterants: marker compounds and non-targeted analysis

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Abstract

Coffee is one of the most highly valued, consumed and comercialized foods in the world. Due to its considerable importance, it has become the target of numerous adulterations. Detecting a possible adulteration and the presence of additional adulterants in coffee has become an issue of great concern mainly because the compounds used as adulterants exhibit physical features very similar to ground roasted coffee. Aiming to overcome these difficulties, this work reports the development and application of a relatively faster, highly effective and reliable method for the detection and identification of adulterations in roasted coffee through the analysis of the composition of the volatile fraction in the presence of adulterants such as rice, corn, soybeans and barley. The proposed method was based on gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC–MS) and chemometric tools. The application of the method led to the exclusive identification of many compounds in the volatile fraction of the adulterants investigated. The adulterants, despite having compounds similar to coffee, differed in terms of their volatile profiles, and consisted mainly of hydrocarbons, aldehydes, esters and carboxylic acids. Among all the compounds identified, five compounds were found to be the main determinants of adulteration: 2-furanmethanol-acetate, 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol, 5-methyl-2-furancarboxaldehyde, 2-furanmethanol and glycerol-1,2-diacetate.

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Acknowledgements

The authors do sincerely acknowledge their indebtedness and gratitude to the Consorcio Café, Rio de Janeiro State Research Foundation (FAPERJ-E-26.201.302/2022, E-26/210.306/2022 and E-26/202.046/2022), the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq-311108/2021-0), the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES-Finance Code 001) and the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP, process number 2021/12866-9) for the provision of resources and for the financial assistance granted in support of this work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto de Química, Departamento de Química Analítica, Físico-Química e Inorgânica, Universidade Estadual Paulista “Júlio de Mesquita Filho” (UNESP), Rua Professor Francisco Degni, 55, Araraquara, São Paulo, 14800-060, Brazil

    João Carlos de Souza

  2. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Alimentos e Nutrição (PPGAN), Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO), Av. Pasteur, 296, Rio de Janeiro, 22290-240, Brazil

    Cinthia de Carvalho Couto

  3. Instituto Federal de Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia da Bahia (IFBA), Rua Gileno de Sá Oliveira, 271, Barreiras, Bahia, 47808-006, Brazil

    Alexandra Mara Goulart Nunes Mamede

  4. Universidade Federal Tecnológica do Paraná (UTFPR), Via Rosalina Maria Dos Santos, 1233, Campo Mourão, Paraná, 87301-899, Brazil

    Patrícia Valderrama

  5. Laboratório de Estudos Interdisciplinares do Meio Ambiente e Alimentos (LEIMAA), Universidade da Integração Latino-americana (UNILA), Av. Tancredo Neves, 6731, Foz do Iguaçu, Paraná, 85867-970, Brazil

    Aline Theodoro Toci

  6. Embrapa Agroindústria de Alimentos, Av. das Américas, 29501, Rio de Janeiro, 23020-470, Brazil

    Otniel Freitas-Silva

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  1. João Carlos de Souza
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  2. Cinthia de Carvalho Couto
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  3. Alexandra Mara Goulart Nunes Mamede
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  4. Patrícia Valderrama
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  5. Aline Theodoro Toci
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  6. Otniel Freitas-Silva
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Correspondence to Aline Theodoro Toci or Otniel Freitas-Silva.

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de Souza, J.C., de Carvalho Couto, C., Mamede, A.M.G.N. et al. Using volatile compounds for the identification of coffee adulterants: marker compounds and non-targeted analysis. Eur Food Res Technol (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00217-024-04563-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00217-024-04563-3

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