Identificação de carotenoides em vegetais, in-natura, utilizando espectroscopia fotoacústica.

Abstract

In the present work, green, red, orange, purple, white and yellow varieties of bell pepper (Capsicum L. annuum) samples were analyzed. These analyzes were done through two different spectrometers, one being a Photoacoustic Spectrometer and the second one being an Conventional UV-Visible Spectrometer, both belonging to the Photoacoustic Spectroscopy Laboratory at the Physics Academic Unit of the Federal University of Campina Grande. the main objective of these analyses were to determine the presence of biomolecules in the bell peppers, namely the carotenoid group, thus proving the effectiveness of the Photoacoustic technique as a differentiate method for investigation, given that most spectroscopy techniques need previous preparation, e.g. solubilization, which is known to cause unwanted effects on the samples as shift on the measured spectrum's peaks besides possible changing the present compounds, as previously reported[1, 2], while in PAS the measurements might be made in-natura. The measured PAS spectra were compared with the UV-Visible measured spectra and with the spectra found at the literature.