Determination of the Carbohydrate Profile and Invertase Activity of Adulterated Honeys after Bee Feeding

Abstract

The higher demand for honey from consumers, combined with its limited availability, has led to different types of honey adulteration, causing substantial economic as well as negative impacts on consumers’ nutrition and health. Therefore, a need has emerged for reliable and cost-effective quality control methods to detect honey adulteration to ensure both the safety and quality of honey. To simulate the process with those applied by beekeepers in real-time, bee colonies were fed with different types of bee feeding (sugar syrup, candy paste and commercial syrup). The produced samples were analyzed for their carbohydrate profile and their invertase activity with the aim to find the effects of bee feeding on the quality of the final product. Honey samples produced after feeding with commercial syrup presented low fructose (22.9 %) and glucose (31.7 %) concentrations and high content of maltose (20.1%), while the samples that came from bee feeding with sugar syrup and candy paste had high concentrations of sucrose (6.2 % and 3.2 %, respectively), exceeding in some cases the legislative limits. Moreover, the samples coming from sugar feeding had lower values of invertase activity, while the group with inverted syrup was clearly discriminated through multi-discriminant analysis. The invertase activity of control samples was found at 153.7 U/kg, which was significantly higher compared to the other groups. The results showed that bee feeding during honey production might lead to adulteration, which can be detected through routine analyses, including the carbohydrate profile and the invertase activity.

Comparative Palynological, Physicochemical, Antioxidant and Antibacterial Properties of Romanian Honey Varieties for Biomedical Applications

“…×150 mm) (Agilent) set at 30 °C. The elution was performed using a mobile phase consisting of a mixture of acetonitrile: pure water in a ratio of 75 : 25 (v/v), at a flow rate of 0.5 mL/min [68] . The carbohydrates’ identification was conducted by comparison of the retention time to that of used standards (fructose, glucose, sucrose).…”

“…The color was determined using the Pfund scale after applying the following formula: The elution was performed using a mobile phase consisting of a mixture of acetonitrile: pure water in a ratio of 75 : 25 (v/v), at a flow rate of 0.5 mL/min. [68] The carbohydrates' identification was conducted by comparison of the retention time to that of used standards (fructose, glucose, sucrose). Serial dilutions of the stock solution of monosaccharide standards were used to build the calibration curves.…”

The role of honey in the treatment of type 2 diabetes mellitus: a review of literature

“…19 The sugar proportion of honey is an important signature used in differentiating natural honey from adulterated honey. 20 The protein content of honey ranges from 0.2 to 0.5% in the form of enzymes and free amino acids. The free amino acid in honey is approximately between 10 to 200 mg/100 g of honey and proline contributes 50% of the total amino acid in natural honey.…”

Adulteración de la miel de abeja

“…Esta situación fue detectada como uno de los principales problemas que confronta la apicultura en Panamá (Lara, 2023); lo cual es consecuencia de la creciente demanda por estos productos y, dada la escasez de los mismos, ocurre la adulteración con la cual, además de los perjuicios económicos, también se pone en riesgo la salud de los consumidores (Kanelis et al, 2022). Por otro lado, factores como el cambio climático, la reducción de los recursos florales necesarios como consecuencia de la expansión de la frontera agrícola y proyectos de vivienda, el uso inconsciente de plaguicidas de síntesis, entre otras acciones realizadas por los seres humanos, han comprometido significativamente la viabilidad de la apicultura en algunos escenarios (Medvid et al, 2023).…”