Recent advances in the development of a diagnostic test for irradiated foodstuffs

Recent advances in the development and application of diagnostic tests for irradiated foodstuffs are reviewed. Exposure of water, the major chemical constituent of most foodstuffs to a source of ionising radiation initially generates the highly reactive radical species H., .OH and e- (aq) which react very rapidly with a wide variety of biological molecules. The detection of foodstuffs subjected to irradiation processing requires the identification and/or quantification of 'unnatural' chemical species (i.e. those not usually formed by normal metabolic processes) produced by the attack of .OH radical or e- (aq) on suitable 'target' molecules. Modern methods for the analysis of a series of these 'unnatural' products arising from the interaction of radiolytically-generated .OH radical or e- (aq) with polyunsaturated fatty acids, DNA, aromatic compounds and other biologically important scavenger molecules are examined. It is concluded that the analytical test to be conducted is highly dependent on the nature of the foodstuff to be tested.