Evolutionary Approaches to Variable Selection

The importance of juice beverages in daily food habits makes juice authentication an important issue, for example, to avoid fraudulent practices. A successful classification model should address two important cornerstones of the quality control of juicebased beverages: to monitor the amount of juice and to monitor the amount (and nature) of other substances added to the beverages. Particularly, sugar addition is a common and simple adulteration, though difficult to characterize. Other adulteration methods, either alone or combined, include addition of water, pulp wash, cheaper juices, colorants, and other undeclared additives (intended to mimic the compositional profiles of pure juices) (Saavedra, García, & Barbas, 2000).