Multidimensional scaling as a method to correlate sensory and instrumental data of orange juice aromas

Changes of orange juice aromas due to storage time and temperature were studied through sensory detection of differences between samples, and by gas chromatographic analysis of 38 volatile constituents. Multidimensional scaling was applied to sensory and instrumental data prior to correlation analysis. Absolute concentrations of volatile constituents were not correlated with sensory data but higher correlations were observed with normalised analytical data. Thus, correlation coefficients were respectively 0.47 and 0.74 when considering (i) relative concentrations of all volatiles, by expressing the concentration of each constituent in a sample as a proportion of the maximum observed concentration of this constituent; and (ii) relative concentrations of only those constituents showing significant (95% level) changes due to storage length or temperature.