Abstract:
The article presents the study results of the physicochemical properties of sunflower honey. It was found that the mass fraction of water in sunflower honey ranged from 16.2% to 18.2%, invert sugar from 76.5-80.0%, sucrose - 1.0-3.25%, diastase number - 11.19-24.29 Gothe units, oxymethylfurfural - 1.92-4.8 mg/kg and total acidity - 2.08-2.73 cm3 NaOH solution in (milliequivalents) per 100 g of honey, depending on year, soil and climatic zones. The sunflower honey collected from the Central zone (Nisporeni) contained the highest amounts of Zinc (1.65 mg/kg), Copper (1.49 mg/kg) and Iron (2.48 mg/kg) in comparison with the Southern and Northern zones. The total amount of microelements was 8.14-10.12 mg/kg depending on the zone. The content of Chromium was <1,5 mg/kg regardless of the year and honey collection zone, Nickel was <2,5 mg/kg. It was found that the largest amount of macronutrients was contained in the sunflower honey collected from the Northern zone - 2347.96 mg/kg, 1.42-3.49 times more than in the Southern zone, and 3.30 times more than in the Central zone. It was found that the total amount of heavy metals in sunflower honey collected from the Northern zone was 2.04 mg/kg, the Southern zone - 2.19 mg/kg (2020) - 3.27 mg/kg (2021) and the Central zone 3.7 mg/kg.