Orange, mandarin, and hybrid classification using multivariate statistics based on carotenoid profiles

A study was undertaken to differentiate citrus on the basis of a carotenoid profile obtained from the HPLC determination of 12 carotenoids found in sa ponified fresh juice. Mandarin, orange, and; various hybrid varieties were analyzed to determine their carotenoid profiles. The resulting peak areas w ere analyzed using principal component analysis (PCA), canonical discrimina te analysis (CDA), and Mahalanobis distances. These were used to develop mo dels fdr classifying the juices into appropriate groups. Thirty-two samples were analyzed to determine classification techniques. Mandarin and orange juices were quite distinct, with the hybrids scattered throughout the manda rin and orange clusters using PCA. CDA resulted in three distinct groups wi th only a few of the hybrids in the orange grouping.