Optical Sensor in the Measurement of Fruits Quality: A Review on an Innovative Approach (original) (raw)

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Design guidelines for a quality assessment system of fresh fruits in fruit centers and hypermarkets

When the fresh fruit reaches the final markets from the suppliers, its quality is not always as good as it should, either because it has been mishandled during transportation or because it lacks an adequate quality control at the producer level, before being shipped. This is why it is necessary for the final markets to establish their own quality assessment system if they want to ensure to their customers the quality they want to sell. In this work, commissioned by a multinational hypermarket enterprise, a system to control fruit quality at the last level of the distribution channel has been designed, after gathering information about the movement of commodities inside company and its requirements. The system combines rapid control techniques with laboratory equipment and statistical sampling protocols, to obtain a dynamic, objective process, which can substitute advantageously the quality control inspections carried out visually by human experts at the reception platform of most trade centers as the one studied. Portable measuring equipment have been chosen (firmness tester, temperature and humidity sensors...) as well as easy-to-use laboratory equipment (texturometer, colorimeter, refractometer...) combining them to control the most important fruit quality parameters (firmness, color, sugars, acids). A complete computer network has been outlined to control all the processes and store the collected data in real time, and to perform the computations. The sampling methods have been also defined to guarantee the confidence of the results. Some of the advantages of a quality assessment system as the proposed one are: the minimization of human subjectivity, the ability to use modern measuring techniques, and the possibility of using it also as a supplier's quality control system. It can be also a way to clarify the quality limits of fruits among members of the commercial channel, as well as the first step in the standardization of quality control procedures.

A quality assessment system for fresh fruits in hypermarkets and fruit trading centres

1998

When the fresh fruit reaches the final markets from the suppliers, its quality is not always as good as it should, either because it has been mishandled during transportation or because it lacks an adequate quality control at the producer level, before being shipped. This is why it is necessary for the final markets to establish their own quality assessment system if they want to ensure to their customers the quality they want to sell. In this work, a system to control fruit quality at the last level of the distribution channel has been designed. The system combines rapid control techniques with laboratory equipment and statistical sampling protocols, to obtain a dynamic, objective process, which can substitute advantageously the quality control inspections carried out visually by human experts at the reception platform of most hypermarkets. Portable measuring equipment have been chosen (firmness tester, temperature and humidity sensors...) as well as easy-to-use laboratory equipmen...

Systems to Characterise Internal Quality of Fruit and Vegetables

Acta Horticulturae, 2006

In this paper an overview will be given of recent developments in systems to measure the internal quality of horticultural produce. First vibration and impact based techniques to nondestructively measure the firmness of fruit will be introduced as an alternative to Magness-Taylor penetrometry. Next optical techniques (NIR and ATR-FTIR spectroscopy) to measure taste components of intact fruit and juices will be discussed. Novel techniques such as time and space resolved spectroscopy for the estimation of light absorption and scattering properties of vegetable tissue, as well as NIR hyperspectral imaging techniques will be addressed, as well as electronic tongues and biosensor arrays. This overview will be concluded with some recent developments in systems to measure aroma such as headspace fingerprint mass spectrometry and electronic noses.

Quality Prerequisites of Fruits for Storage and Marketing

Quality is a major component that attracts consumers of all ages. If the consumers like it, they are ready to pay a premium price. India is the second largest producer of fruits in the world. However, quality of the produce is not up to the world standard level. There may be many reasons for this, but one of the main reasons is lack of knowledge. Most producers are small and marginal farmers and they are not much aware about quality. Country's current distribution system of fresh produce is also inefficient in maintaining quality in the long supply chain between producers and consumers. With the amendment in the policy of Agricultural Produce Market Committee, recently a few reputed companies entered into fruit business on small, medium, and large-scale. These firms increased quality bars of Indian fruits as only quality fruits are purchased and sold by these firms. jpht Technical Article

Internal Fruit Quality: How to Influence It, How to Define It

Acta Horticulturae, 2006

Fruit quality is influenced by cultural management in field, by the fruit picking time and by the storage strategy. The choice of the best techniques and strategies to enhance fruit quality is difficult, and even more complicate is the definition of the internal fruit quality changes occurring in pre-and post-harvest conditions. In fact, internal fruit quality is strictly related to the changes occurring during the ripening and maturation syndrome. Define them with accuracy would allow to verify the techniques adopted validity, to monitor the evolution of the ripening in field and in storage and finally to offer a uniform fruit quality to the consumers. Fruit internal quality is represented by the fruit texture, the sugars and organic acids content, the flavour, etc. Although a precise definition of the quality would require equipped laboratory and knowledgeable personnel, the standard techniques for assessing fruit quality are quite simple (refractometer and penetrometer for flesh soluble solids content and flesh firmness; titration for acidity, etc). These determinations are carried out on samples of a limited number of fruit, often not representative of all the fruit, but give the possibility to have real-time information. However, recently, the availability of non-destructive techniques to assess fruit quality, also offer real-time information, allow to determine quality traits on a high number or even on all the fruit, to repeat the analyses on the same samples monitoring their physiological evolution, to determine with the same measurement a number of information on several fruit quality parameters. Here are reported examples on how the internal fruit quality can be influenced (harvest time, 1-MCP applications, storage strategy) and the possibility offered by NIRs (near infrared spectroscopy) and electronic-nose non-destructive devices to monitor and define fruit quality changes of some fruit specie in pre-and post-harvest situations.

IJERT-A Review on Non-Destructive Techniques for Evaluating Quality of Fruits

International Journal of Engineering Research and Technology (IJERT), 2015

https://www.ijert.org/a-review-on-non-destructive-techniques-for-evaluating-quality-of-fruits https://www.ijert.org/research/a-review-on-non-destructive-techniques-for-evaluating-quality-of-fruits-IJERTV4IS090670.pdf Even though the fruit ripening is a natural process, it can also be processed by means of different artificial fruit ripening agents. In the recent years, due to the effect of artificial ripening of fruits the various health related issues has increased. Thus the consequence of artificial ripening has become questionable. There are both direct and indirect health hazards allied with artificial fruit ripening agents, which requires both qualitative and quantitative analysis of chemicals and their impact on fruit quality. So it is important to evaluate the quality of artificially-ripened fruits, and to analyze the changes in food value. The presence of artificial ripening agent is usually encountered on the fruit skin. But it is also very important to enumerate the existence of detrimental chemicals within fruit-flesh and to analysis the impact of these chemicals on the food value of artificially ripened fruits. This paper is a review in image processing in order to design a fruit grading system based on Machine vision, Near infrared spectroscopy and Hyperspectral imaging.

A Review on Non-Destructive Techniques for Evaluating Quality of Fruits

International Journal of Engineering Research and, 2015

Even though the fruit ripening is a natural process, it can also be processed by means of different artificial fruit ripening agents. In the recent years, due to the effect of artificial ripening of fruits the various health related issues has increased. Thus the consequence of artificial ripening has become questionable. There are both direct and indirect health hazards allied with artificial fruit ripening agents, which requires both qualitative and quantitative analysis of chemicals and their impact on fruit quality. So it is important to evaluate the quality of artificially-ripened fruits, and to analyze the changes in food value. The presence of artificial ripening agent is usually encountered on the fruit skin. But it is also very important to enumerate the existence of detrimental chemicals within fruitflesh and to analysis the impact of these chemicals on the food value of artificially ripened fruits. This paper is a review in image processing in order to design a fruit grading system based on Machine vision, Near infrared spectroscopy and Hyperspectral imaging.

Use of Non-Destructive Devices as a Decision Support System for Fruit Quality Enhancement

EUFRIN Thinning Working Group Symposia, 2013

Fruit quality as a concept encompasses sensory and mechanical properties, nutritive values and food safety. Fruit quality has declined, leading to consumer dissatisfaction, largely due to the wrong harvest date. In addition, quality is poorly defined since the parameters mainly considered are fruit size and skin colour. Other attributes such as flesh firmness, sugar content, acidity and aroma, which are perceived by the consumer as overall fruit quality, are seldom considered by the farmer and by other individuals along the value chain. Up to now, several studies have been carried out on fruit quality assessment by using traditional methods, which are cheap and fast, but do not consider other quality traits, as antioxidant power, aroma volatile emission, soluble sugars and organic acids content. The assessment of these parameters requires sophisticated equipments (i.e. HPLC, GC-MS) and is costly and time consuming. Moreover, destructive analyses can be performed only on a limited number of fruit. In recent years, extensive research has been focused on the development of non-destructive techniques for assessing internal fruit quality attributes allowing extending the assessment to a high number of fruit, to repeat the analysis on the same samples and to achieve real-time information on several fruit quality parameters at the same time. Among the non-destructive techniques, visible/Near infrared spectroscopy (VIS/NIR) can be efficiently used for determining traditional fruit quality traits and concentration of the main organic acids and reducing sugars. In addition, this technique allows defining a new maturity index with a close correlation to fruit ethylene emission and ripening stage. This "Absorbance Difference" Index (I AD) can be used for precisely predicting harvest date and for grouping fruit in homogeneous classes of ripening.