Russian scientists have found a way to monitor the safety of vegetables after radiation therapy using the “fingerprint” method. This was reported by the press service of the RNF.
When storing fresh vegetables and fruits, disinfection is usually done to prevent bacterial growth. Previously, chemicals were used for these purposes, but they harm the environment and health. An alternative method is to expose food to intense radiation (X-rays) that causes free radicals to form in vegetables. They kill bacteria but also start a chain of chemical reactions. In this regard, it is necessary to strictly control the dose of radiation absorbed and keep it within the required range: enough to kill bacteria, but not enough to damage food or impair taste.
In this regard, scientists from Moscow State University proposed the “fingerprint” method. During the radiation process, chemical reactions occur in the samples, and the longer the irradiation lasts, the more the products of these transformations accumulate. The resulting substances are not present in the original vegetable. If certain interacting reagents are added to the treated sample, the degree of radiation therapy can be determined by the change in color and fluorescent glow of the products of such a reaction.
The authors used two varieties of potato tubers in the experiments to demonstrate the effectiveness of the method on samples of different nature. The scientists treated the tubers with known doses of X-ray and electron radiation, ranging from zero to 10 kiloGray. Next, reactions were carried out with the participation of three different fluorescent dyes in the samples, that is, those that, when illuminated, emit light of a certain wavelength. Taken together, the reactions performed helped to see the differences in tubers that received different doses. The computer algorithm helped distinguish between the original and different doses of irradiated potato samples of the same variety with an accuracy of up to 100% when irradiated with an electron beam and up to 95% when using X-ray waves.
Scientists consider the created method to be universal and hope to control the composition of other products disinfected by radiation in the future.
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