Artificial Intelligence Tasked To Find Better Tasting Fruits and Veggies
University of Florida researchers are looking to create an “Artificial Intelligence Connoisseur,” a model that tells researchers which chemical compounds (the volatiles, sugars, acids, and other chemical compounds) produce the best flavors in fruits and vegetables.
In a new study, UF/IFAS plant breeder and geneticist Marcio Resende and other scientists used artificial intelligence to gather smell and taste data on tomatoes and blueberries. Resende led the new research that shows ways to get data from volatiles in blueberries and tomatoes into a statistical model. The research findings are now limited to those two fruits but will later be expanded to other crops UF/IFAS researchers develop.
To conduct their new study, UF/IFAS researchers used tomato and blueberry breeding program data from the past decade. They gave a diverse set of tomato and blueberry varieties to consumer panels at the UF Sensory Lab in Gainesville. The scientists then collected ratings on flavor attributes such as “liking,” sweetness, sourness, flavor intensity, and umami.
UF/IFAS researchers tested the range of scores that tell them how much a consumer likes a flavor. As it turns out, volatiles explained up to 56% of the “like” scores, which reinforces evidence that volatiles are important in determining how much consumers like the fruit. Volatiles are also important in quantifying and estimating the importance of fruit flavor, Resende says.
For more, continue reading at blogs.ifas.ufl.edu.
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