Food Fraud and Food Authenticity across the Food Supply Chain—Volume II: Rapid and Innovative Methods for Food Authenticity and Food Integrity

Dear Colleagues,

The concept of the “integrity” of foods is of primary interest for worldwide consumers and is strictly correlated with food fraud and food safety issues. The awareness of food origin and authenticity from the consumer’s perspective (but also from that of the food producer, distributor and retailer) has become increasingly strategic during the last 10 years. Moreover, when the idea of the “circular economy” took hold (particularly regarding the re-use and valorization of by- and co-products), the ability to trace food ingredients/complex foods and their origin became a strict necessity. The capacity to track and authenticate ingredients/foods across the food supply chain using analytical and molecular tools (often coupled today with the use of the advanced statistical post-analysis processing, as well as with the use of the artificial intelligence-based approaches) is currently considered the right process to trace quality and safety along food chains. In addition to the process based on the blockchain idea, the application of analytical and biotechnological solutions protects the rights of consumers, in terms of the availability of food characterized by high quality and safety, combatting food fraud.

Considering all these findings, the development of novel rapid methods (including both analytical and molecular approaches) is strictly required, also considering developing rapid methods useful for at-line and on-line measurement and testing. The micro-/nano-sensor area is another key area of intervention.

This issue focuses particularly on the following topics: the set-up, validation and application of rapid methods for food integrity and traceability, in an attempt to combine analytical science, food science, technology and molecular sciences in a holistic approach.

Prof. Dr. Marco Arlorio
Dr. Matteo Bordiga
Guest Editors

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• food authenticity and traceability
• ingredients/food fingerprinting
• development of methods for food quality, safety and traceability
• detection of undeclared novel ingredients in foods
• analytical solutions (targeted and untargeted methods) for food authenticity and traceability
• role of rapid methods in food analysis, particularly focusing on food authenticity and food integrity assessment
• micro- and nano-sensors for food authenticity and food analysis
• new molecular methods and new biotechnological approaches for food authenticity and traceability (e.g., NGS, DNA metabarcoding, molecular probes)
• role of innovative approaches (hyphenated, comprehensive, AI-supported) for food analysis