Organic food is welcomed by the general public because people think organic food is more environment-friendly and can introduce a healthy lifestyle. This popular notion is under scrutiny recently. Compared with conventional food, does the organic food we obtained from local farms and/or supermarket chains are actually chemically healthier? In this research, organic fruit and vegetables with USDA certification from local farmers and popular supermarket chains, along with their conventional counterparts, were collected and studied by a radioanalytical method—instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA). Samples were irradiated by thermal and epithermal neutrons from the PULSTART nuclear reactor. After that, regular gamma-ray spectroscopy was applied to obtain the qualitative and quantitative information of target isotopes. Our preliminary study indicated that there is not much difference in the trace elements content between organic food and its conventional counterpart. Some heavy metals, which are commonly regarded as the source of harmful components, are detected in both categories. In terms of methodology, INAA is proved to be a sensitive radioanalytical tool to tell the elemental information on atomic or nuclear levels. However, as a nuclear technique, it lacks the capability to probe the properties of compounds on the molecular level, which may be the real difference between organic and nonorganic food.
| Published in | Radiation Science and Technology (Volume 7, Issue 3) |
| DOI | 10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12 |
| Page(s) | 53-59 |
| Creative Commons |
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited. |
| Copyright |
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Science Publishing Group |
Organic Food, Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis (INAA), Element Analysis
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APA Style
Zaijing Sun, Yaoling Long, Qingsheng Cai. (2021). A Study of the Organic and Nonorganic Food Ingredients with Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis. Radiation Science and Technology, 7(3), 53-59. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12
ACS Style
Zaijing Sun; Yaoling Long; Qingsheng Cai. A Study of the Organic and Nonorganic Food Ingredients with Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis. Radiat. Sci. Technol. 2021, 7(3), 53-59. doi: 10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12
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Download@article{10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12,
author = {Zaijing Sun and Yaoling Long and Qingsheng Cai},
title = {A Study of the Organic and Nonorganic Food Ingredients with Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis},
journal = {Radiation Science and Technology},
volume = {7},
number = {3},
pages = {53-59},
doi = {10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12},
url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12},
eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.rst.20210703.12},
abstract = {Organic food is welcomed by the general public because people think organic food is more environment-friendly and can introduce a healthy lifestyle. This popular notion is under scrutiny recently. Compared with conventional food, does the organic food we obtained from local farms and/or supermarket chains are actually chemically healthier? In this research, organic fruit and vegetables with USDA certification from local farmers and popular supermarket chains, along with their conventional counterparts, were collected and studied by a radioanalytical method—instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA). Samples were irradiated by thermal and epithermal neutrons from the PULSTART nuclear reactor. After that, regular gamma-ray spectroscopy was applied to obtain the qualitative and quantitative information of target isotopes. Our preliminary study indicated that there is not much difference in the trace elements content between organic food and its conventional counterpart. Some heavy metals, which are commonly regarded as the source of harmful components, are detected in both categories. In terms of methodology, INAA is proved to be a sensitive radioanalytical tool to tell the elemental information on atomic or nuclear levels. However, as a nuclear technique, it lacks the capability to probe the properties of compounds on the molecular level, which may be the real difference between organic and nonorganic food.},
year = {2021}
}
TY - JOUR T1 - A Study of the Organic and Nonorganic Food Ingredients with Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis AU - Zaijing Sun AU - Yaoling Long AU - Qingsheng Cai Y1 - 2021/07/29 PY - 2021 N1 - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12 DO - 10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12 T2 - Radiation Science and Technology JF - Radiation Science and Technology JO - Radiation Science and Technology SP - 53 EP - 59 PB - Science Publishing Group SN - 2575-5943 UR - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.rst.20210703.12 AB - Organic food is welcomed by the general public because people think organic food is more environment-friendly and can introduce a healthy lifestyle. This popular notion is under scrutiny recently. Compared with conventional food, does the organic food we obtained from local farms and/or supermarket chains are actually chemically healthier? In this research, organic fruit and vegetables with USDA certification from local farmers and popular supermarket chains, along with their conventional counterparts, were collected and studied by a radioanalytical method—instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA). Samples were irradiated by thermal and epithermal neutrons from the PULSTART nuclear reactor. After that, regular gamma-ray spectroscopy was applied to obtain the qualitative and quantitative information of target isotopes. Our preliminary study indicated that there is not much difference in the trace elements content between organic food and its conventional counterpart. Some heavy metals, which are commonly regarded as the source of harmful components, are detected in both categories. In terms of methodology, INAA is proved to be a sensitive radioanalytical tool to tell the elemental information on atomic or nuclear levels. However, as a nuclear technique, it lacks the capability to probe the properties of compounds on the molecular level, which may be the real difference between organic and nonorganic food. VL - 7 IS - 3 ER -
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