Fast Determination of Royal Jelly Freshness by a Chromogenic
Reaction
Royal jelly is one of the most important products of
honeybees. Given its role in development of bee brood into fertile individuals
of the royal caste it is also used in health products for human consumption.
Royal jelly spoils and loses its health-promoting properties
depending on storage duration and conditions. To ensure product quality before
selling, it is therefore necessary to assess royal jelly freshness.
Many indexes of freshness have been suggested, but they all
lack reliability or require complex and time-consuming analyses. Here we
describe a method to detect royal jelly freshness based on a chromogenic
reaction between royal jelly and HCl. We demonstrate that analyses based on
color parameters allow for the discrimination of royal jelly samples based on
the duration of their storage.
Color parameters of royal jelly stored at −18 and 4 °C for 28 d remained
comparable to that of fresh samples, which supports the reliability of the
method. The method of freshness determination described is practical, cheap,
and fast and can thus be used in real-time when trading royal jelly.
Practical Application: The method developed can be used to
assess royal jelly freshness. It is practical, cheap, and fast and can thus be
used in real-time when trading royal jelly.