Discrimination of Soft Drinks using a Chemical Sensor and Principal Component Analysis

A new technique that uses a chemical sensor coupled with multivariate analysis is evaluated and applied to discriminate soft drinks from different vendors. The headspace volatiles of different cola samples were analysed using a chemical sensor that uses quadruple mass-spectrometer technology. Analysis timers per sample averaged between 3 to 4 minutes. Soft drink samples were used to train the chemical sensor with acceptable mass spectra patterns. Small variations in the mass spectra profiles of the samples were detected using principal component analysis (PCA).