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. 2023 Aug 8;18(8):e0289702.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0289702. eCollection 2023.

Assessing the quality of bee honey on the basis of melissopalynology as well as chemical analysis

Zahra Shakoori  1 , Ahmadreza Mehrabian  1 , Dariush Minai  1 , Farid Salmanpour  2 , Farzaneh Khajoei Nasab  1
Affiliations

Assessing the quality of bee honey on the basis of melissopalynology as well as chemical analysis

Zahra Shakoori et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Melissopalynological and chemical analysis of honey provide us useful and valuable information about the botanical and geographical origin of honey. The data in question is very important for authentication as well as for testing the quality of honey, so this is considered the main method in honey regulation here, we have used chemical analysis and melissopalynology to evaluate different honey samples from two main Iranian hubs of honey. Sampling was carried out on two important poles in Iran's honey production, the central Alborz region, and the mountainous Zagros ecosystems in the years 2020 to 2021. Therefore, 52 samples from Alborz (Northern Iran), as well as 42 samples from the Zagrosian ecosystems (western Iran) belonging to different ecological habitats, were collected. In addition, samples were taken at 7 altitudes from 0 to 3500 m a.s.l. Furthermore, in this study, various chemical analyses such as the effect of antioxidant activity, the amount of total phenolic content, pH, and moisture content of honey samples were evaluated. Our results showed that all honey samples were classified as polyfloral honey. Based on our findings, 57 honey samples (61%) contained the standard amount of pollen. A total of 42 plant families and 55 genera were identified in the studied samples, with the highest presence of Asteraceae, Fabaceae, Rosaceae, Apocynaceae, and Apiaceae. Finally, an antioxidant activity ratio of 19% to 98%, total phenolic content from 0.08 to 0.51 ppm, pH from 1.90 to 5.21, and moisture content from 13% to 18.40%.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that there are no competing interests.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1. Study area and sample collection points.
All the sampling locations are marked using red dots.
Fig 2
Fig 2. Percentage of presence of each plant family that was identified through analysis of pollen of 94 honey samples.
Fig 3
Fig 3
A. Some pollen images of the Asteraceae family. B. Some pollen images of the Rosaceae family. C. Some pollen images of the Fabaceae family. D. some pollen images of the Apocynaceae family.
Fig 4
Fig 4. Number of samplings performed at different altitude intervals.
Fig 5
Fig 5. The antioxidant activity abundance ratio of honey samples.
Fig 6
Fig 6. Comparison of antioxidant activities with altitude.
Fig 7
Fig 7. pH abundance ratio of the samples.
Fig 8
Fig 8. Regression related to the effect of environmental humidity on the moisture of honey samples.
Fig 9
Fig 9. Principal component analysis (PCA) scatter plot of the studied honey samples based on total phenolic content, antioxidant activity, pH, and moisture content.
Fig 10
Fig 10. Dendrogram of the studied honey samples according to their botanical family composition and clustered by UPGMA (unweighted pair group method using Euclidean distance).
Cophenetic correlation coefficient = 0.8565.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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