Determination of Adulteration Content in Extra Virgin Olive Oil Using FT-NIR Spectroscopy Combined with the BOSS–PLS Algorithm

This work applied the FT-NIR spectroscopy technique with the aid of chemometrics algorithms to determine the adulteration content of extra virgin olive oil (EVOO). Informative spectral wavenumbers were obtained by the use of a novel variable selection algorithm of bootstrapping soft shrinkage (BOSS) during partial least-squares (PLS) modeling. Then, a PLS model was finally constructed using the best variable subset obtained by the BOSS algorithm to quantitative determine doping concentrations in EVOO. The results showed that the optimal variable subset including 15 wavenumbers was selected by the BOSS algorithm in the full-spectrum region according to the first local lowest value of the root-mean-square error of cross validation (RMSECV), which was 1.4487 % v/v. Compared with the optimal models of full-spectrum PLS, competitive adaptive reweighted sampling PLS (CARS–PLS), Monte Carlo uninformative variable elimination PLS (MCUVE–PLS), and iteratively retaining informative variables PLS (IRIV–PLS), the BOSS–PLS model achieved better results, with the coefficient of determination (R(2)) of prediction being 0.9922, and the root-mean-square error of prediction (RMSEP) being 1.4889 % v/v in the prediction process. The results obtained indicated that the FT-NIR spectroscopy technique has the potential to perform a rapid quantitative analysis of the adulteration content of EVOO, and the BOSS algorithm showed its superiority in informative wavenumbers selection.