Study on stable radicals produced by ionizing radiation in dried fruits and related sugars by electron paramagnetic resonance spectrometry and photostimulated luminescence method – I. D-fructose

Stability of sugar born radicals separated from irradiated Iranian dried raisins and from D-fructose by Sigma Aldrich has been studied at room temperature by EPR and PPSL methods in a period of 360 days. It has been proven for the first time experimentally that the complex EPR spectrum of irradiated sugars is changed in time and after heating. Hence, this made it possible to distinguish spectral lines of two specific radicals contributing to the formation of multicomponent spectra, recorded in both time dependent and heating experiments. The radicals measured by EPR and energy traps detected by PPSL decay at room temperature in a similar way, suggesting a similar distribution of both species in sugar crystallites. We think that our experimental approach might be useful to study interrelation between the formation and trapping of radicals and energy accumulated in crystalline matrices. In order to achieve the isolation of individual sugars from fruits the extraction and specific separation procedures have been adapted with the use of methanol, ethanol and water solvents. Our results clearly show that radicals induced by radiation in fruits (with fructose born radicals as major constituent) are stable enough at room temperature for easy identification of irradiated raisins using the EPR method.