Diffuse reflectance mid-infrared Fourier transform spectroscopy (DRIFTS) for rapid identification of dried sea cucumber products from different geographical areas

In this study, diffuse reflectance mid-infrared Fourier transform spectroscopy (DRIFTS), principal components analysis (PCA) and soft independent modeling of class analogy (SIMCA) were performed on the classification of dried sea cucumber samples of the same species from various geographical areas using fingerprint region (1700–600 cm−1). A set of 96 individual dried sea cucumbers (Apostichopus japonicus Selenka) grown up in four different geographical regions (Rongcheng, 16 individuals; Weihai, 20 individuals; Yantai, 40 individuals; Dalian, 20 individuals) in East China Sea were analyzed and successfully differentiated into four classes according to the distribution of geographical areas in spite of small differences in IR fingerprints. The result shows that the environmental influencing factor is the key factor contributing to the classification of sea cucumbers. And, this study also demonstrates that DRIFTS is a convenient tool for fast differentiation of seafoods from various geographical areas, such as dried sea cucumber products.