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Applications of electronic tongue system for quantification of safranal concentration in saffron (Crocus sativus L.)

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Abstract

In the present research the electronic tongue system was proposed consisted of an array of 4 voltammetric sensors to discriminate saffron samples based on the safranal concentration. Different samples were provided by blending saffron samples with distilled water and pure safranal with ethanol. The provided signals by the electronic tongue system were analyzed using the PCA and ANN methods. The total variance among safranal concentrations by PCA method were 90% and 100% in pure safranal and saffron samples, respectively. Also, it was revealed that the electronic tongue could provide good prediction for safranal concentration in saffron as 98.81% accuracy by means of optimized ANN model. Results showed that there are some relationships between HPLC and electronic tongue signals to determine safranal concentration levels in different saffron samples.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to appreciate the invaluable support of Ilam University in this study and also extend their gratitude to those individuals who were kind enough to review this paper, scrutinize the whole text, and adduce their helpful comments for the improvement of this paper.

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Correspondence to Kobra Heidarbeigi.

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Authors has received research grants from Ilam University.

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Yousefi-Nejad, S., Heidarbeigi, K. & Roushani, M. Applications of electronic tongue system for quantification of safranal concentration in saffron (Crocus sativus L.). Food Measure 15, 1626–1633 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11694-020-00723-7

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