New Insights in Quality Evaluation of Plant-Derived Foods

Dear Colleagues,

The preference for plant-derived foods (even though not exclusively) is known to provide both health and environmental benefits. However, it must be acknowledged that not all plant-derived foods present the same quality to consumers. Hence, traditional and novel tools to ensure high-quality standards have to be applied to these types of foods. At the same time, the definition of quality may be different from product to product and must be studied accordingly. Therefore, the content in bioactive compounds, fat amount or fatty acid profiles, vitamins, carbohydrates, volatile compounds, but also microbial safety or sensorial characteristics, are some of the parameters that can provide an insight into plant-derived food quality. Innovative processing types (e.g., non-thermal technologies and novel thermal processing technologies) also need to be looked at from a food quality point of view. Of course, all these types of foods are usually subject to some kind of postharvest processing or storage, which can alter their properties. This has also led to the need to study how these procedures change the characteristics of the original food.

This Special Issue on “New Insights in Quality Evaluation of Plant-Derived Foods” invites researchers to contribute with original research or review articles that focus on this main topic of quality assessment of plant-derived foods. This includes novel approaches to this line of research, but also the use of established methodologies to novel plant foods, understudied species, or new data on known plant foods. 

Dr. Ivo Vaz de Oliveira
Dr. Sílvia Martins Martins Afonso
Guest Editors

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