3. Results and discussion
3.1. UV–Vis absorbance spectra
Fig. 1 presents the UV–Vis absorption spectra of the aqueous extracts
of the 175 coffee samples in the range 225–353 nm. This region
can be associated with n ? p* electronic transition of caffeine,
chlorogenic acids and trigonelline molecules. In particular, the
band around 275 nm is related to the C@O chromophore absorption
of caffeine (López-Martínez et al., 2003). It is worth noting that
chlorogenic acids and trigonelline are decomposed with roasting
(Illy & Viani, 1995). However, the presence of the bands around
290 and 320 nm suggests that these compounds were not entirely
decomposed in the medium roasting process (Vitorino et al., 2001).
In order to investigate the repeatability of the spectral measurements,
four samples (one from each class) were employed. Ten
extractions were carried out for each sample and three spectra
were acquired from each extract. By using these measurements,
the pooled standard deviation estimated for each spectral variable
ranged from 5.5 104 to 2.4 103 in absorbance. Such values,
which correspond to the variability of the instrumental response
for a given sample, are much smaller than the inter-sample variability,
as illustrated in Fig. 2.