Office of the Leading Team of Product Quality and Food Safety Holds Third Meeting

The Office of the Leading Team of Product Quality and Food Safety of the State Council held its third meeting on September 10. Li Changjiang, Minister of AQSIQ, presided over the meeting, and Pu Changcheng, Deputy Director of AQSIQ, also attended.……

China International Food Safety and Quality Conference 2007 Held in Beijing

Officials, experts and scholars from different countries and intemational organizations attended the China International Food Safety and Quality Conference 2007 on September 12-13. ……

Food Safety Detection Methods Applied to National Special Rectification of Product Quality and Food Safety

Afour-month period of national special rectification for product quality and food safety officially started on August 25, and was focused on eight fields, including those of agricultural products and processed foods.……

Multisensor Data Fusion for High Quality Data Analysis and Processing in Measurement and Instrumentation

Multisensor data fusion （MDF） is an emerging technology to fuse data from multiple sensors in order to make a more accurate estimation of the environment through measurement and detection. Applications of MDF cross a wide spectrum in military and civilian areas. With the rapid evolution of computers and the proliferation of micro-mechanical/electrical systems sensors, the utilization of MDF is being popularized in research and applications. This paper focuses on application of MDF for high quality data analysis and processing in measurement and instrumentation. A practical, general data fusion scheme was established on the basis of feature extraction and merge of data from multiple sensors. This scheme integrates artificial neural networks for high performance pattern recognition. A number of successful applications in areas of NDI （Non-Destructive Inspection） corrosion detection, food quality and safety characterization, and precision agriculture are described and discussed in order to motivate new applications in these or other areas. This paper gives an overall picture of using the MDF method to increase the accuracy of data analysis and processing in measurement and instrumentation in different areas of applications.

Traceability implementation in food supply chain: A grey-DEMATEL approach

Numerous incidents of food adulteration,fraudulence and foodborne disease outbreaks have shaken the consumer confidence towards the food they consume.These incidents compel the Food Supply Chain(FSC)partners to implement an appropriate traceability system in their respective supply chains to sustain the consumer confidence.The objective of this research is to identify the drivers(major factors)which play a significant role in the successful implementation of the traceability system in FSC and evaluate the causal relationships developing therein.Twelve drivers are identified towards implementation of the traceability system in FSC through literature review and supported with expert’s opinion.The grey-based DEMATEL approach is identified to evaluate these relationships among the drivers according to their net effect.Further,these drivers ranked based on the prominence and effect score.The finding of this research shows that the drivers are clustered into two groups namely:influential(cause)and influenced(effect)group.Four drivers belong to the influential group,and remaining eight are from the influenced group.The most influential driver is the “food safety and quality”which provide a significant effect on the implementation of a traceability system.This research can be a building block to develop a framework to implement the traceability system within FSC and assist the policymakers,and practitioners to identify and evaluate drivers related to the implementation of traceability system in FSC.This paper also provides a useful insight&support to the practitioners and managers in decision making for traceability implementation related issues。

Recent trends and technical advancements in biosensors and their emerging applications in food and bioscience

Biosensor development has recently advanced as a result of their strong and indisputable uses as analytical methods in a variety of sectors,including medicine,food industry,environmental monitoring,metabolism,agriculture,military,and security.The popularity of biosensors as devices for a variety of applications may be ascribed to their distinct advantages of fast or rapid analysis,high sensitivity,minimal sample demand and preparation,and no need for the specific skill of operation that traditional analytical procedures require.We attempted to update earlier studies in this study by incorporating other materials that have been in use but have received less attention,such as carbon nano-onions(CNOs),metal-organic frameworks(MOFs),and biopolymers for biosensor manufacturing and design based on their unique properties.The assessment also took into account applicable applications in many sectors.Although considerable progress has been made in the application of biosensors,there is still a need for research development and enhancement,particularly in transforming most of the laboratory experiments that have already been published into portable on-site and implementable in the public domains.

Nano-selenium controlled cadmium accumulation and improved photosynthesis in indica rice cultivated in lead and cadmium combined paddy soils

Selenium nanoparticles(Se NPs) are less toxic and more biocompatible than selenite or selenate. However, studies involving spraying with Se NPs for reducing accumulation of cadmium(Cd) and lead(Pb) in rice grains have been rarely reported as yet. Herein, indica rice seedlings cultivated in Cd + Pb-spiked paddy soils(denoted as positive control) were sprayed with Se NPs sols for four times from tillering to booting stage. Compared to positive control, 50–100 μmol/L Se NPs downregulated Cd transporters-related genes such as Os LCT 1, OsH MA 2 and Os CCX2 in leaves and OsLCT1, Os PCR1 and Os CCX2 genes in node I at filling stage. Meanwhile, Se-binding protein 1 was distinctly elevated, involving the repression of Cd and Pb transportation to rice grains. Se NPs also differentially improved RuBP carboxylase and chlorophylls especially some key genes and proteins involving photosynthetic system. Besides, 25–50 μmol/L Se NPs diminished reactive oxygen species overproduction from NADPH oxidases whereas boosted glutathione peroxidase, reducing protein carbonylation in rice seedlings. However, the antioxidant isozymes and oxidatively modified proteins were slightly rebounded at 100 μmol/L. Se contents were noticeably elevated and confirmed to exist as selenomethionine in the rice grains following all the treatments by Se NPs. Thus, the optimal dosage of Se NPs for foliar application is 50 μmol/L, which significantly decreased Cd accumulation, improved photosynthesis and Se enrichment whereas caused no distinct reduction of Pb in the grains. Thus, an appropriate dosage of Se NPs can be conducted to decrease Cd accumulation, improve photosynthesis, and organic Se contents in rice grains.

Optical non-destructive techniques for small berry fruits: A review

Small berries including strawberry and blueberry are extensively consumed fruits with great economic values due to their characteristic flavor and appearance as well as potential health benefits.This review elaborated the optical non-destructive techniques viz.Vis-NIR spectroscopy,computer vision system,hyperspectral imaging,multispectral imaging,laser-induced method and thermal imaging,and their applications for quality and safety control of small berry fruits.The discussion regarding the photoacoustic technique,X-ray technique,Terahertz spectroscopy,odor imaging,micro-destructive testing and smart mobile terminal-based analyzer was also presented.Furthermore,we proposed our personal understanding of the technical challenges and further trends for these optical non-destructive techniques:1)owing to the relatively low detection limit,the so-called micro-destructive techniques may be alternative to the traditional non-destructive techniques in both practical and fundamental research;2)we suggest that the research articles like“collecting data first,and then modeling the relevant properties of agricultural products by machine learning”should be less produced in related fields.That's because such research methods are likely to be suspected of“cheating”.It is recommended that some modeling competitions can be carried out in the agricultural engineering field to avoid or reduce the“cheating”model.