Why NIR helps to control the beer process production?
As reported recently: ‘Near infrared and mid infrared spectroscopy offer opportunities to predict dozens to hundreds of compounds simultaneously at different stages of the brewing process.’ This gives an opportunity to monitor and ensure the stability of the complex wort and beer composition, not just content of specific components. NIR can help at different stages of beer production from cereal breeding to the quality control of the final product.
The opportunities for NIR during crucial steps in beer production involve:
- Mashing
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- Monitoring of the increasing amounts of the hydrolysed products as an indication of sugar and amino acids levels by NIF calibrated for optimal wort Plato [P]
- Specifically for proteins, Kolbach Index, one of the main Malt quality specification, can be predicted with NIR
- NIR has also a potential in monitoring other critical parameters, such as non-starch polysaccharides affecting viscosity, bitterness, colour, pH, biomass, organic acids content.
- Fermentation
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- NIF can measure fermentation efficiency, for example by monitoring apparent attenuation limit (AAL). Attenuation, the percentage of sugars which yeast are consuming during fermentation, is a critical parameter in monitoring the progress of the beer production as it affects its final taste. More attenuated beer, meaning a beer in which higher percentage of sugar has been converted into ethanol, is more alcoholic and drier than less attenuated beer, even if it is made from the same starting material.
- Post-production
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- Here an opportunity to detect bacterial contaminations has been identified
The use of multiple sensors calibrated for different reference samples gives the opportunity to provide data on very different parameters used in beer production. This can contribute to more effective digitalization of the beer production process, facilitating application of reinforcement learning-based process control which can provide multivariate-based recommendation to the brewer expert on how to optimise the process.
Literature:
Fox, The Brewing Industry and the Opportunities for Real-Time Quality Analysis Using Infrared Spectroscopy, Applied Sciences 10(2), 2020