Non-destructive determination of fat and moisture in whole Atlantic salmon by near-infrared diffuse spectroscopy

A near-infrared spectrometer equipped with an interactance optical fiber probe was used to determine the average crude fat and moisture content in the muscle of whole Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar). The fat contents were 8.8-19.2% and moisture 61.0-70.8%, and fish weight range 1.0-5.7 kg. A partial least square regression including 49 salmon resulted in root mean square error of cross validation of 1.12% fat (R = 0.87) and 0.98% moisture (R = 0.86). Results showed that MR interactance was a suitable non-destructive screening method for fat and moisture content in fanned Atlantic salmon.