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Analytical Methods for Safety and Quality Control of Functional Food

A special issue of Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049). This special issue belongs to the section "Food Chemistry".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 August 2026 | Viewed by 590

Editors


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Guest Editor
Biotechnology and Germplasm Resources Institute, Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Kunming 650205, China
Interests: functional foods; food science and technology; food analytical methods; food safety and quality; crop genetics and breeding; barley and functional rice

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Guest Editor
Institute of Quality Standard and Testing Technology for Agro-Products, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Ministry of Agriculture of China, Beijing 100081, China
Interests: application of molecularly imprinted polymers and nanomaterials in the separation and analysis of pesticides, veterinary residues, and active components from agro-products; construction, synthesis, and application of EC, SPR, SERS, and optical sensors based on molecularly imprinted technology chips for analysis of small molecular compounds; study on the effect of pesticides and other processing factors on the functional component of agricultural products
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Functional foods represent an interdisciplinary frontier combining food science and preventive medicine. Food safety and quality are the core of functional foods research and development, primarily utilizing chromatography, spectroscopy, mass spectrometry and enzymatic analysis methods. Gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GCMS) is currently the most powerful tool for food safety and quality control, especially volatile, pesticide residues and harmful chemicals, due to its high sensitivity, high resolution and accurate qualitative and quantitative capabilities; near-infrared spectroscopy is a cost-effective indirect analytical technique; enzyme immunoassay readers are widely used in food safety testing, biopharmaceuticals and related fields. These functional foods and food safety and quality analysis have significant theoretical implications and a high practical value for the new global strategy of disease prevention through diet. We invite authors to contribute original articles and review articles that provide the readers of Molecules with new and updated perspectives of analytical methods for food safety and quality. It is our aim that, via collaboration, we can contribute to establishing new interests in the development of functional foods.

Prof. Dr. Yawen Zeng
Prof. Dr. Yongxin She
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • functional foods
  • food analytical methods
  • food safety
  • food quality
  • functional food production
  • GC-MS
  • volatile components

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

19 pages, 2270 KB  
Article
Screening and Validation of Q-Markers for Daodi Authenticity of Lycium barbarum L. Using Multi-Component Quantification and Chemometrics
by Yuying Hu, Kai He, Qun Luo, Ying Wang, Hongyu Jin, Feng Wei and Yongqiang Lin
Molecules 2026, 31(12), 2059; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules31122059 - 12 Jun 2026
Viewed by 280
Abstract
To identify quality markers (Q-markers) for daodi authenticity evaluation of Lycium barbarum L., a comprehensive strategy integrating appearance trait analysis, multi-component quantification, and chemometrics was developed. Forty-five sample batches were collected from four major producing areas in China, namely Ningxia (NX), Gansu (GS), [...] Read more.
To identify quality markers (Q-markers) for daodi authenticity evaluation of Lycium barbarum L., a comprehensive strategy integrating appearance trait analysis, multi-component quantification, and chemometrics was developed. Forty-five sample batches were collected from four major producing areas in China, namely Ningxia (NX), Gansu (GS), Qinghai (QH), and Inner Mongolia (NM). Appearance traits (50-fruit weight, moisture, and color) and the contents of polysaccharide, total sugar, betaine, zeaxanthin dipalmitate, and 27 small-molecule compounds, including flavonoids and phenolics, were determined using UV–vis spectrophotometry, HPLC-CAD, and UPLC-MS/MS. Pearson correlation analysis revealed a significant negative association between polysaccharide and total sugar (r = −0.344, p < 0.05), suggesting a possible allocation shift between the two carbohydrate fractions, while zeaxanthin dipalmitate strongly correlated with redness (r = 0.609, p < 0.01). Principal component analysis identified total sugar, polysaccharide, scopoletin, and scopolin as key discriminatory variables. AHP-CRITIC combined weighting highlighted polysaccharide (weight 0.195) and zeaxanthin dipalmitate (weight 0.157) as candidate core Q-markers. Top-ranked comprehensive scores predominantly belonged to samples from NX and GS, chemically supporting the traditional daodi authenticity. This dual-dimensional “efficacy–trait” framework provides a robust, traceable basis for origin authentication and quality standard improvement of L. barbarum. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Analytical Methods for Safety and Quality Control of Functional Food)
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