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Foods
Special Issues
Recent Advances in the Detection of Food Contaminants and Pollutants
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Recent Advances in the Detection of Food Contaminants and Pollutants

A special issue of Foods (ISSN 2304-8158). This special issue belongs to the section "Food Analytical Methods".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 21 July 2025 | Viewed by 2996

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Francesca Buiarelli

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Chemistry, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Interests: food safety; food analysis; fraud; contamination analysis; GC–MS; HPLC–MS/MS; CE-UV; HPLC-Q TRAP atmospheric pollution; bioaerosol; drug metabolites
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Giulia Simonetti

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Chemistry, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Interests: environmental chemistry; particulate matter; organic pollutants; trace metal analysis; bioaerosol; oxidative potential; occupational exposure; food contact material migration; risk assessments; ICP-MS; GC–MS; CE-UV; HPLC–MS/MS; HPLC-QTRAP
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Foods are a source of nutrients and energy for mankind. However, due to physicochemical changes during food handling, preparation and storage, combined with aging, oxidation, hydrolysis and rancidity reactions, the texture and original taste/flavor of foods and food safety may be altered.

At the same time, the presence and occurrence of "old and new" pollutants and intentional and non-intentional contaminants can seriously compromise not only the nutritional value and organoleptic characteristics, but also harm human health.

The main disadvantage when detecting chemicals in food samples is the different and varied chemical–physical nature of the analytes, which may require multiple approaches, and often, there is no single technique able to solve the problem.

Alongside traditional detection systems, mass spectrometry (MS) and tandem mass spectrometry (MS-MS), combined with different separation methodologies, are the most suitable and ideal techniques thanks to their high sensitivity, selectivity and ability to manage complex mixtures from qualitative (targeted and non-targeted analyses) and quantitative (up to ultra trace level) point of views.

This Special Issue aims to collect the latest studies and recent technological advances in mass spectrometry and its integration with alternative/complementary techniques for the correct and broadest possible characterization of food contaminants and pollutants.

Dr. Francesca Buiarelli
Dr. Giulia Simonetti
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Foods is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • food contamination
  • pollutant detection
  • metabolites
  • targeted and untargeted analysis
  • separative techniques
  • mass spectrometry
  • spectroscopic techniques
  • food safety

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Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

16 pages, 839 KiB  
Article
Monitoring of Cadmium, Lead, and Mercury Levels in Seafood Products: A Ten-Year Analysis
by Luisa Garofalo, Marcello Sala, Claudia Focardi, Patrizio Pasqualetti, Daniela Delfino, Francesca D’Onofrio, Barbara Droghei, Francesca Pasquali, Valentina Nicolini, Flavia Silvia Galli, Paola Scaramozzino, Alessandro Ubaldi, Katia Russo and Bruno Neri
Foods 2025, 14(3), 451; https://doi.org/10.3390/foods14030451 - 30 Jan 2025
Viewed by 1226
Abstract
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) monitors the presence and concentration of contaminants in food to mitigate health risks. EU legislation sets maximum levels of heavy metals in foods, including cadmium (Cd), lead (Pb), and total Hg (THg) in seafood, due to their [...] Read more.
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) monitors the presence and concentration of contaminants in food to mitigate health risks. EU legislation sets maximum levels of heavy metals in foods, including cadmium (Cd), lead (Pb), and total Hg (THg) in seafood, due to their toxicity. In the framework of official control, between 2014 and 2023, 5854 seafood samples were collected and 4300 analyses for THg, 3338 for Cd, and 2171 for Pb were performed using Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS) and cold vapor atomic absorption spectrometry (CVAAS). The aim was to assess the proportion of contaminated foods in the dataset, the concentration of contaminants, and the potential health risks associated with their intake. Of the total samples analyzed, 142 (2.43%) were found to be non-compliant (n.c.). Concentrations exceeding the limits for Cd were primarily detected in cephalopods (n = 17), mainly squids. In contrast, Hg levels exceeded the limits in marine fish (n = 118), notably in swordfish (11.30% of n.c. samples among those analyzed for this species), sharks (6.48%), and tuna species (3.11%). Regarding Pb, only a single bivalve sample was found to exceed the maximum limits. A preliminary assessment of weekly exposure to Hg through swordfish consumption raised concerns about the frequent intake of marine top predators, particularly for vulnerable people. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in the Detection of Food Contaminants and Pollutants)
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11 pages, 1948 KiB  
Article
Fast and Reliable On-Site Quality Assessment of Essential Raw Brewing Materials Using MicroNIR and Chemometrics
by Giuseppina Gullifa, Chiara Albertini, Elena Papa, Rita Petrucci, Paola Di Matteo, Martina Bortolami, Stefano Materazzi and Roberta Risoluti
Foods 2024, 13(17), 2728; https://doi.org/10.3390/foods13172728 - 28 Aug 2024
Viewed by 1101
Abstract
The interest in the quality control of the raw materials, intermediates, and final products, as well as production methods, of beer has increased significantly in recent decades due to the needs and expectations of consumers. Increasing in the industrialization and globalization of beer [...] Read more.
The interest in the quality control of the raw materials, intermediates, and final products, as well as production methods, of beer has increased significantly in recent decades due to the needs and expectations of consumers. Increasing in the industrialization and globalization of beer supply chains led to a need for novel analytical tools suitable for the rapid and reliable characterization of the materials involved. In this study, an ultracompact instrument operating in the NIR region of the spectrum, microNIR, was tested for the chemical investigation of barley malts. The essential raw materials for brewing require careful control since they deeply affect the characteristic flavor and taste of the final products. Therefore, a robust prediction model able to classify base and specialty barley malts was developed starting from NIR measurements. Soft Independent Class Analogy (SIMCA) was selected as the chemometric technique for the optimization of two prediction models, and ground and sieved materials were investigated using spectroscopy. The microNIR/chemometric approach proposed in this study permitted the correct prediction of the malt samples included in the external validation set, providing false positive and false negative rates no higher than 3.41% and 0.25%, respectively, and confirming the feasibility of the novel analytical platform. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in the Detection of Food Contaminants and Pollutants)
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