Affiliations: [a] Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Autónoma de San Luis Potosí UASLP. Av. Salvador Nava, 78290, San Luis Potosí, S.L.P., México | [b] CONACYT, México | [c] Instituto de Investigación de Zonas Desérticas, Universidad Autónoma de San Luis Potosí UASLP. Altair 200, El llano, 78377, San Luis Potosí, S.L.P., México | [d] Laboratorio de Pruebas de Productos Maderables – LINCE Red de Ambiente y Sustentabilidad, Instituto de Ecología, A.C., Carretera antigua a Coatepec 351, El Haya, 91070, Xalapa, Ver., México | [e] Coordinación para la Innovación y la Aplicación de la Ciencia y la Tecnología, Universidad Autónoma de San Luis Potosí, Sierra Leona 550, Lomas 2da. Sección, 78210, San Luis Potosí, SLP, México
Abstract: Raman spectroscopy and multivariate analysis techniques are proposed as a method to evaluate the mezcal (Agave distillate) aging. Multivariate analysis was performed using Principal component analysis discriminant analysis (PCA-DA) and Partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA). The first principal component discriminates between aged and rested matured mezcal while the second principal component discriminates between non-matured and matured mezcal. PCA-DA and PLS-DA were chosen as supervised classifiers to predict the belonging of unlabeled spectra to one of the aging classes with accuracy of 93%. The results agree with previously published work and also demonstrated that using a reduced Raman spectral region it is possible the discrimination mezcal with different aging time. A reduction on the spectral information allows development of a Raman instrumentation with reduced complexity and cost with specific application to alcoholic beverage quality assessment.
