Authentication and Provenance of Walnut Combining Fourier Transform Mid-Infrared Spectroscopy with Machine Learning Algorithms

• Published in: Molecules (Basel, Switzerland) Switzerland), 2020-10, Vol.25 (21), p.4987
• Main Authors: Zhu, Hongyan, Xu, Jun-Li
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Algorithms; Back propagation networks; Chemical analysis; Classification; Consumers; Cultivars; Fatty acids; Feature selection; Food products; Food Quality; Fourier analysis; Fourier transform mid-infrared spectroscopy; Fourier transforms; genetic algorithm-partial least squares; Geographical distribution; Geography; Honey; Infrared spectra; Infrared spectroscopy; Juglans - chemistry; Juglans - classification; Learning algorithms; Machine Learning; Mean square errors; Neural networks; NMR; Nuclear magnetic resonance; Origins; Provenance; Random variables; Species classification; Spectroscopy, Fourier Transform Infrared; successive projection algorithm; walnut; Walnuts; Wavelet transforms
• ISSN: 1420-3049; 1420-3049
• DOI: 10.3390/molecules25214987

Different varieties and geographical origins of walnut usually lead to different nutritional values, contributing to a big difference in the final price. The conventional analytical techniques have some unavoidable limitations, e.g., chemical analysis is usually time-expensive and labor-intensive. Therefore, this work aims to apply Fourier transform mid-infrared spectroscopy coupled with machine learning algorithms for the rapid and accurate classification of walnut species that originated from ten varieties produced from four provinces. Three types of models were developed by using five machine learning classifiers to (1) differentiate four geographical origins; (2) identify varieties produced from the same origin; and (3) classify all 10 varieties from four origins. Prior to modeling, the wavelet transform algorithm was used to smooth and denoise the spectrum. The results showed that the identification of varieties under the same origin performed the best (i.e., accuracy = 100% for some origins), followed by the classification of four different origins (i.e., accuracy = 96.97%), while the discrimination of all 10 varieties is the least desirable (i.e., accuracy = 87.88%). Our results implicated that using the full spectral range of 700-4350 cm is inferior to using the subsets of the optimal spectral variables for some classifiers. Additionally, it is demonstrated that back propagation neural network (BPNN) delivered the best model performance, while random forests (RF) produced the worst outcome. Hence, this work showed that the authentication and provenance of walnut can be realized effectively based on Fourier transform mid-infrared spectroscopy combined with machine learning algorithms.