Rapid prediction of phenolic compounds and antioxidant activity of Sudanese honey using Raman and Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy

- Phenolic compounds and antioxidant activity were determined in honey using conventional methods.
- Accurate prediction of phenolics and antioxidant activity using FTIR and Raman were established.
- Good predictive results were obtained for phenolics and antioxidant activities (R2 > 0.92).

Fourier transform infrared with attenuated total reflectance (FTIR-ATR) and Raman spectroscopy combined with partial least square regression (PLSR) were applied for the prediction of phenolic compounds and antioxidant activity in honey. Standards of catechin, syringic, vanillic, and chlorogenic acids were used for the identification and quantification of the individual phenolic compounds in six honey varieties using HPLC-DAD. Total antioxidant activity (TAC) and ferrous chelating capacity were measured spectrophotometrically. For the establishment of PLSR model, Raman spectra with Savitzky-Golay smoothing in wavenumber region 1500-400 cm−1 was used while for FTIR-ATR the wavenumber regions of 1800-700 and 3000-2800 cm−1 with multiplicative scattering correction (MSC) and Savitzky-Golay smoothing were used. The determination coefficients (R2) were ranged from 0.9272 to 0.9992 for Raman while from 0.9461 to 0.9988 for FTIT-ART. The FTIR-ATR and Raman demonstrated to be simple, rapid and nondestructive methods to quantify phenolic compounds and antioxidant activities in honey.