Equipment of nuclear magnetic resonance for non-destructive analysis of agricultural and food products

• Grant number: 16/00989-0
• Support type: Research Grants - Innovative Research in Small Business - PIPE
• Duration: November 01, 2016 - April 30, 2019
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Chemistry - Analytical Chemistry
• Principal researcher: André de Souza Carvalho
• Grantee: André de Souza Carvalho
• Company: Fit Comércio, Importação e Exportação de Máquinas e Equipamentos Odonto-Médicos Hospitalares e Laboratoriais Ltda
• City: São Carlos
• Pesquisadores principais: Luiz Alberto Colnago

Abstract

The agricultural sector is one of the major contributors to the Brazilian economy, representing 16% of the country's Gross Domestic Product and being the third largest agricultural exporter in the world. This sector has a high demand for technologies and methods to optimize process and certification of product quality. Many of the physical and chemical methods already used by the industry are laborious, destructive or simplistic. Examples are processes that select fruit by visual inspection, by weight or by spectroscopic methods that are limited to analyze only the surface of the product. Because it is a non-destructive technique, which analyzes the internal properties of the product, spectroscopy of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) often results in more accurate analysis compared with other techniques, resulting in optimization of process as demonstrated by several papers in the scientific literature. Although already present in the agricultural and food sector, the use of NMR spectroscopy is still very low, where the main difficult is the need for specific solutions for every industrial problem, the high total cost associated and the development of suitable equipment for each application. The main goal of this project is to develop a commercial low cost equipment, transportable and with the potential to perform physical-chemical analyzes of agricultural and food products, mainly for measurement of oil content in Dendê raw, analysis of fresh fruits or processed, and detection of olive oil adulteration. Therefore, this project will result in a nuclear magnetic resonance equipment, national and of high quality for the agricultural sector, attending the demand for innovative solutions in the control of production or quality in production centers, wholesale and retail and by importers and exporters. (AU)