Qualitative and Quantitative Metabolite Comparison of Korean Traditional Alcoholic Beverages: Takju , Yakju , and Traditional-Soju

• Published in: Foods Vol. 13; no. 6; p. 956
• Main Authors: Tak, Hyun-Ji, Lee, Na-Rae, Yang, Sowon, Kim, So-Young, Lee, Choong-Hwan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 21.03.2024; MDPI
• Subjects: Alcohol; Alcoholic beverages; Amino acids; Beverages; Chromatography; Fatty acids; Fermentation; Gas chromatography; Grain; Korean traditional alcoholic beverages; Liquor; Mass spectrometry; Mass spectroscopy; Metabolites; non-targeted metabolite profiling; Octanoic acid; Organic acids; Palmitic acid; Particle size; Potassium; quantitative metabolite analysis; Sensors; Succinic acid; United States > US; South Korea; quantitative metabolite analysis; fatty acids; non-targeted metabolite profiling; organic acids; amino acids; Korean traditional alcoholic beverages
• ISSN: 2304-8158; 2304-8158
• DOI: 10.3390/foods13060956

With increasing interest in Korean foods and beverages, Korean traditional alcoholic beverages need to be studied. To characterize Korean traditional alcoholic beverages, we analyzed the metabolites of , , and using 48 commercial products. We performed non-targeted metabolite profiling using gas chromatography time-of-flight mass spectrometry (GC-TOF-MS) and identified 33 significantly discriminant metabolites, including nine organic acids, three amino acids, and seven fatty acids, in the three types of alcoholic beverage. Subsequently, we quantified the profiled metabolites in each product and compared their contents to identify alcoholic beverage type-specific metabolites. Thus, we figured out seven metabolites using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves. The results revealed that octadecanoic acid (limit of detection (LOD) to 168.72 mg/L), nonanoic acid (LOD to 112.54 mg/L), and octanoic acid (8.00 to 145.08 mg/L) in ; succinic acid (LOD to 1.90 mg/mL), heptanoic acid (LOD to 343.23 mg/L), and hexadecanoic acid (20.28 to 126.45 mg/L) in ; and malonic acid (LOD to 19.13 mg/mL) in , with an area under the curve (AUC) > 0.7, are important metabolites that can distinguish the type of alcoholic beverage. Our results provide qualitative and quantitative metabolite information about Korean traditional alcoholic beverages that can be used by consumers and manufacturers.