The chemical composition and quality of honey depend on the floral and geographical origin, extraction techniques, and storage, resulting in a unique product for each area. Currently, consumers are not only concerned about the chemical composition, quality, and food safety of honey, but also about its origin. The objective of this study was to characterize honeys produced in Chile’s central-southern region from a mineral and botanical perspective, thus adding value through differentiation by origin. Two hundred honey samples were used and underwent analysis such as melissopalynological composition, nutritional composition, and color. Forty-seven melliferous floral species were identified, out of which 24 correspond to exotic species and 23 to native species. Fifty-six percent were classified as monofloral honeys, 2% as bifloral, and 42% as multifloral. Moisture mean values (17.88%), diastase activity (15.53 DN), hydroxymethylfurfural (2.58 mg/kg), protein (0.35%), and ash (0.25%) comply with the ranges established by both the national and the international legislation; standing out as honeys of great nutritional value, fresh, harvested under optimal maturity conditions, and absence fermentation. Regarding color, light amber was prevalent in most territories. The territory where honey was produced, denoted relevant differences in all the parameters studied.

Calibration models for the nutritional quality of fresh pastures by nearinfrared reflectance spectroscopy

Bovine milk is one of the most complete foods that exist. During the last decades, milk FA have shown to improve human health due to the reduction in risk of cardiovascular disease and related pathologies. The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) reflectance analysis to predict the nutritional value, fatty acid (FA) composition, and health index of fresh milk from dairy cows of pastoral systems. The prediction of Atherogenicity and Thrombogenicity indexes, along with other FA ratios in fresh milk samples by NIRS were precise and accurate. In addition, the calibration model obtained by NIRS provides an opportunity for the routine quantification of milk’s healthy FA such as omega-3 and conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), with applications in the dairy industry for food labeling, and at the farm level for management of the dairy cow’s diet.

Increases in cereals grain yield in the last decades have increased the accumulation of straw on the soil after harvest. Farmers typically open burn the straw to prepare the soil for the next crop, resulting in pollution, emission of greenhouse gases, erosion, loss of soil organic matter, and wildfires. An alternative is feeding straw to ruminants, but straw nutritive value is limited by its high content of lignocellulose and low content of protein. Cereal breeding programs have focused on improving grain yield and quality and agronomic traits, but little attention has been paid to straw nutritive value. We screened straw from 49 genotypes of oats and 24 genotypes of wheat from three cereal breeding trials conducted in Chile for in vitro gas production kinetics. We found moderate effects of the genotype on gas production at 8, 24, and 40 h of incubation, and on the maximum extent and rate of gas production. Gas production was negatively associated with lignin and cellulose contents and not negatively associated with grain yield and resistance to diseases and lodging. Effects observed in vitro need to be confirmed in animal experiments before gas production kinetics can be adopted to identify cereal genotypes with more digestible straw.