Quantitative and qualitative assessment of pork meatball containing borax using near infrared spectroscopy

Borax has been used as a food additive for many years to improve theshelf-life and textureof products including pork meatball. However, it has been shown to have toxic effects for consumers, depending on concentration, and its use as an additive has been banned in many countries. Reflectance near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) in the wavelength range of 680-2500 nm was tested for predictingboraxqualitatively and quantitatively in pork meatball to which borax had been added at 0, 50, 100 and 300 ppm. Partial least squares regression (PLSR) was used to develop the calibration model. A test showed the accuracy of the prediction with mean coefficient of correlation (R) of 0.980, the root mean square error of prediction (RMSEP) of 21.70 ppm. Partial least square-discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) was used for developing the classification model to distinguish between meatballswhere borax was added and those where no borax was added. These comparisons gave a classification accuracy of 96.91% between 0 and 50 ppm, 99.69%between 0 and 100 ppm and 100% between 0 and 300 ppm. It was concluded that NIRS, which is a nondestructive technique, has the capability to detect borax in meatballs accurately.