ANALYTICAL SERVICES

The current scope of the InovaLab accreditation includes physical and chemical testing of food (honey, honey products). However, InovaLab also offers additional services important for the assessment of the authenticity of food of plant origin.

Analysis of honey and honey products

Method	Technique	Range	Reference
Determination of moisture content in honey	Refractometry	12 - 27%	Harmonized methods (IHC), method no. 1
Determination of electrical conductivity of honey	Conductometry	0,1 - 3 µS/cm	Harmonized methods (IHC), method no. 2
Determination of free acidity of honey	Volumetric titrations	min 0,5 meq/kg	Harmonized methods (IHC), method no. 4.1
Determination of diastase activity of honey	Spectrophotometry	min 1 DN	Harmonized methods (IHC), method no. 6.1
Determination of hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) in honey	High performance liquid chromatography with UV detection (HPLC/UV)	min 5 mg/kg	Harmonized methods (IHC), method no. 5.1
Determination of sugars in honey (*)	High performance liquid chromatography with amperometric detection (HPLC/PAD)	—	Harmonized methods (IHC), method no. 7.4
Determination of C-4 plant sugars in honey based on ration of stable carbon isotopes (13C/12C)	Isotope ratio mass spectrometry (IRMS)	—	AOAC 998.12.1998

(*) – Glucose, fructose, sucrose, trehalose, isomaltose, turanose, melezitose, raffinose, maltose, and erlose; ratio of fructose and glucose content.

Services out of the accreditation scope

Method	Technique
Determination of sugar profile (or individual sugars) in various samples (fruits, vegetables, wine etc.)	High-performance liquid chromatography with amperometric detection (HPLC-PAD)
Determination of polyphenol profile in various samples (fruits, vegetables, propolis, plant extracts etc.)	Ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry of high resolution (UPLC-LTQ-orbitrap MS-MS) High performance thin layer chromatography (HPTLC)
Determination of individual polyphenols content	HPLC (UPLC)
Determination of total polyphenol content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC), total anthocyanin content (TAC)	Spectrophotometry
Determination of antioxidant capacity of different samples	Spectrophotometry (DPPH)
Determination of ratios of different stable isotopes of C, N, O, H and S	Isotope ratio mass spectrometry (IRMS)
Determination of macro-, micro- and trace elements (including toxic metals)	Inductively coupled plasma - optical emission spectroscopy / mass spectrometry (ICP-OES, ICP-MS)
Determination of physical/chemical parameters and paraffin content in wax	Titrimetry, FTIR, GC-MS
Determination of content of melittin, apamine, and phospholipase in bee venom	HPLC
Determination of content of citrate	High-performance liquid chromatography with conductometric detection (HPLC-CD)