Exploratory study of sugar production using fluorescence spectroscopy and multi-way analysis

This paper is concerned with the possibility of obtaining chemically meanin gful models of complicated processes by the use of fluorescence spectroscop y screening and the unique parallel factor analysis (PARAFAC) model. The se cond-order nature of fluorescence excitation emission data and the fact tha t the PARAFAC model has no rotational indeterminacy mean that in certain ca ses, it is possible to decompose complex mixture signals into contributions from individual chemical components. Relating the thus obtained informatio n to, e.g., important quality parameters, it is possible to analyze, unders tand, predict and monitor the quality based on a chemical foundation. The p roposed approach thus gives a direct link between process analytical chemis try and multivariate statistical process control. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.