Homogeneity and stability assessment of a candidate to pumpkin seed flour reference material by means of computer vision based chemometrics assisted approach

This study proposes a preliminary assessment of the homogeneity and stability through digital image acquisition of a candidate for mechanically processed pumpkin seed meal reference material, exploring the concepts of homogeneity curve and the analysis of texture characteristics by Continuous-Level Moving Block through Robust Principal Component Analysis. This innovative methodology allowed us to examine the percentage of homogeneity in a set of samples, revealing an average of 41% with only one outlier in relation to the entire sample, indicating low homogeneity. In the stability study carried out after storing samples for 12 months at different temperatures, 83% of the samples were considered regular and 17% were outlier, which means that most of them were considered stable. Therefore, this methodology is useful for screening samples for homogeneity, by textural analysis, and detected non-homogeneity can be corrected in advance for quantification by standard protocols.

Automated summary

This study proposes a preliminary assessment of the homogeneity and stability of mechanically processed pumpkin seed meal reference material using digital image acquisition and texture characteristics analysis. The results indicated low homogeneity, with most samples being considered stable.