Abstract
Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) analytical method was used to determine the content of 40 elements in 38 soybean samples (Glycine Max) from 4 countries. Multivariate statistical methods, such as principal components analysis (PCA), were performed to analyze the obtained data to establish the provenance of the soybeans. Although soybean is widely marketed in many countries, no universal method is used to discriminate the origin of these cereals. Our study introduced the initial step to the identification of the geographical origin of commercial soybean marketed in Vietnam. The analysis pointed out that there are significant differences in the mean of 33 of the 40 analyzed elements among 4 countries' soybean samples, namely, (11)B, (27)Al, (44)Ca, (45)Sc, (47)Ti, (55)Mn, (56)Fe, (59)Co, (60)Ni, (63)Cu, (66)Zn, (69)Ga, (75)As, (78)Se, (85)Rb, (88)Sr, (89)Y, (90)Zr, (93)Nb, (95)Mo, (103)Rh, (137)Ba, (163)Dy, (165)Ho, (175)Lu, (178)Hf, (181)Ta, (182)W, (185)Re, (197)Au, (202)Hg, (205)Tl, and (208)Pb. The PCA analysis showed that the soybean samples can be classified correctly according to their original locations. This research can be used as a prerequisite for future studies of using the combination of elemental composition analysis with statistical classification methods for an accurate provenance establishment of soybean, which determined a variation of key markers for the original discrimination of soybean.