A 50‐Year Theoretical Gap on Color Difference in Food Science: Critical Insights and New Perspectives

Résumé fourni par la source

Color measurement in food science has become an extremely simple, nondestructive, and rapid routine analysis. These advantages have made it an extremely widespread analysis in various research applications. Color is usually determined within the CIELAB color space since its publication in 1976. One of the most used parameters is the total color difference between two samples. Unfortunately, this formula has proven to be increasingly inadequate and distant from real human perception, consequently, new formulae and new color spaces have been proposed with the goal of obtaining perceptual uniform color space, based on three colorimetric coordinates and on the theory of opponent colors. However, part of food science research has not fully incorporated these theoretical advancements developed over the past 50 years, as evidenced by the continued use of an outdated formula that is no longer recommended. Furthermore, there is an abuse of the concept of just noticeable difference (JND) applied to food difference color, which, given all the limitations of that color space, should not be reported into a rigorous scientific context. Several JNDs have been proposed over the years, with the sole purpose of supporting the existence of difference between food samples; notably, often these values originated from publication that are outdated or do not support the results with reference or data. This review starts with an overview of the last developments in color science and then proceeds with an analysis of the main misconducts in food research. Simple suggestions to overcome these critical issues were provided at last.

Ce résumé expose les affirmations des auteurs. BNTIC ne l’interprète pas comme une validation indépendante des résultats.