Evaluation of the botanical origin of estonian uni- and polyfloral honeys by amino acid content.
The free amino acid content of 61 honey samples from Estonia has been determined by HPLC-UV with precolumn derivatization with diethyl ethoxymethylenemalonate. Analyzed samples were seven types of unifloral honeys and polyfloral honeys. The main amino acids found in Estonian honeys were proline and phenylalanine. The resulting data have been analyzed by t test and principal component analysis (PCA). t Test revealed that some amino acids (alpha-alanine, beta-alanine, asparagine, gamma-aminobutyric acid, glutamine, glycine, histidine, ornithine, phenylalanine, proline, serine, and tryptophan) are more potent for assigning honey botanical origin than others. PCA enabled differentiation of some honey types by their botanical origin. In the space of the two first principal components, heather honeys form a cluster that is clearly separable from, for example, polyfloral honeys. It is concluded that analysis of the free amino acid profile may serve as a useful tool to assess the botanical origin of Estonian honeys.
Classification of Spanish Unifloral Honeys by Discriminant Analysis of Electrical Conductivity, Color, Water Content, Sugars, and pH.
To ascertain the most discriminant variables for seven types of Spanish commercial unifloral honeys, stepwise discriminant analysis was performed. Fifteen parameters [pH; water content; electrical conductivity; x, y, and L, chromatic coordinates from the CIE-1931 (xyL) color space; fructose; glucose; sucrose; maltose; isomaltose; maltulose; kojibiose; and the fructose/glucose and glucose/water ratios] were considered. The studied honey types were rosemary, citrus, lavender, sunflower, eucalyptus, heather, and forest. The most discriminant variables, as selected by the multivariate program, were electrical conductivity, color (x, y, L), water content, fructose, and sucrose. All sunflower, eucalyptus, and honeydew honey samples and >90% of the samples from the remaining honey types were correctly classified by using the classification functions devised by the program. The overall proportion of accurately arranged samples was 95.7%. Results were validated by the "jackknifed" procedure and showed that electrical conductivity, color, water content, fructose, and sucrose are highly useful parameters to classify unifloral honeys, although microscopical analysis of honey sediment remains the fundamental tool.
Complex telemonitoring of patients and elderly people for telemedical and homecare services
The paper presents a project that has as main goal researches, design and implementation of an electronic-informatics-telecom and scalable system, that allows the automatic and complex telemonitoring, everywhere and every time (at home, in hospitals, at work, of mobile subject etc, using several communication paths), in real time, of persons with chronic illnesses, of elderly people, of those having high medical risk and of those with neurolocomotor disabilities.