Applications of Analytical Chemistry in Food Science

Dear Colleagues,

Analytical chemistry is the basis of studies on the composition and safety of foodstuffs. During the last decades, the possibility of investigating, with increasing accuracy and selectivity, the main chemical components of food, thanks to the use of increasingly advanced analytical techniques, has made it possible to significantly improve the quality of agri-food production, as well as to develop new products that increasingly meet the demand and requests of consumers. Analytical techniques such as spectroscopy, spectrophotometry, and liquid and gas chromatographic techniques, coupled with various types of detectors, are the most historically used approaches, and, although largely replaced by new analytical approaches over the last few years, they still represent a very valid alternative for a series of analytical determinations, thanks to their robustness and versatility.

Over the past decades, the introduction of mass spectrometry, coupled with chromatographic techniques, made it possible to substantially improve some analytical aspects, such as the sensitivity and selectivity of response. Raman, IR, and NIR spectroscopies represent other analytical applications that have recently found wide applications, especially in the field of food characterization and traceability.

Metabolomics, as one of the “omics” technologies, involving the high-throughput study and characterization of metabolites in several systems, including food matrices, deserves special attention. Food metabolites are typically affected by various factors such as species, environment, processing methods, and storage techniques. The variations in these metabolites will directly influence food safety and quality; thus, the use of the metabolomic approach allows the monitoring of metabolite changes during food processing, along with the identification of markers and the optimization of food-processing procedures.

Finally, volatolomics, a branch of “omics” sciences used for the characterization of the volatolome, defined as the volatile fraction of the metabolome at a given time in a given environment, is a new frontier of food science studies. This approach finds applications in multiple fields of research thanks to sophisticated analytical techniques combined with advanced chemometric analyses.

The scope of this Special Issue includes, but is not limited to, the following topics:

• Analytical chemistry in food quality determinations;
• Analytical chemistry in food safety assurance;
• Analytical chemistry in food traceability;
• Analytical chemistry in novel food formulation;
• Spectroscopy and spectrophotometry in food analysis;
• Chromatographic approaches in food analysis;
• Mass spectrometry in food analysis;
• Omics approaches in food analysis;
• Chemometrics in food analysis;
• Quality control and validation procedures in food analysis.

Dr. Marco Iammarino
Dr. Rosalia Zianni
Prof. Dr. Igor Tomasevic
Dr. Annalisa Mentana
Guest Editors

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• chromatography
• chemometrics
• food quality and safety
• IR
• lipidomics
• mass spectrometry
• NIR
• novel food
• omics
• proteomics
• spectroscopy
• spectrophotometry
• Raman
• traceability
• volatolomics