Use of multivariate statistical methods for classification of olive oil

Multivariate statistical methods can contribute significantly to classification studies of extra virgin and common olive oil groups. Therefore, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) was used to discriminate olive oil samples, multivariate statistical techniques Principal Component Analysis PCA, Fuzzy Cluster, Silhouette Validation Method to describe and classify. The groups' distinction into organic and common was observed by applying the non-hierarchical Fuzzy grouping with a distinction between the two groups with a 65% confidence interval. The validation was performed by the silhouette index that presented S (i) of 0.73, which showed that the adopted grouping presented adequate strength and distinction criterion. However, PCA only analyzed the behaviors of data from extra virgin olive oil. Thus, the Fuzzy clustering method was the most suitable for classifying extra virgin olive oil.