# Electronic Sensing Technologies in Food Quality Assessment: A Comprehensive Literature Review
## 1 Introduction  
Food quality is a concept that encompasses many aspects, from sensory experience to safety and nutritional value, making it an important factor influencing consumer choices. The fundamental condition in this respect is food safety. Both elements are closely related and together create the criteria by which customers evaluate food. In most cases, food quality changes dynamically [1]. The development of the economy and the growth of prosperity have significantly increased the awareness of consumers of harmful substances in food and have led to an increase in the demand for high-quality food. The important problems that are currently emerging in the food industry are the authenticity and safety of food, real-time monitoring during food processing, evaluation of organoleptic characteristics, quality assessment, and traceability of food origin [2]. Often, there are many products on the market that are presented as authentic or 100% natural, but are imitations or counterfeit versions of high-quality products, causing great harm to health and destroying consumer confidence. In this area, e-noses and e-tongues are starting to be used as tools to strengthen quality control and to guarantee the authenticity of products in a faster but also reliable way [3]. The shelf life of food is primarily determined by its inherent quality characteristics, packaging, and environment factors, such as transport, storage conditions, and climate. They contribute to the modification of the sensory, chemical, physical, and microbiological characteristics of the product [4]. From the moment of processing and storage to the moment when products reach consumers, food quality and safety must be constantly monitored and controlled. This is to protect people from food poisoning and potentially reduce food waste [5]. Ensuring food safety is complex and requires monitoring many variables at every stage of the food supply chain, such as freshness, authenticity, toxin levels, and the presence of pathogenic bacteria and contaminants [5]. A reduction in quality characteristics may result in the loss of the commercial quality of the product, but not necessarily the loss of its hygienic, sensory, or nutritional properties. Furthermore, the shelf life of a perishable product depends mainly on environmental and hygienic conditions at the stages of production and storage [6]. The introduction of inappropriate food products into the market is a huge threat to consumer health. Therefore, it is very important to use appropriate hazard detection technology to ensure rapid, accurate, and real-time detection of unsafe food products [7; 8; 9]. The global food industry is facing increasing challenges in ensuring food safety, sustainability, and quality due to the increasing demands of consumers in a changing environment. To address these challenges, industry experts and researchers are using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) technologies as effective tools to transform safety assessment and quality management [10]. These technologies use visual, acoustic, chemical, and electronic sensors. Intermodal intelligent sensing technologies play a key role in food science and are widely used in food assessment [11]. Food assessment methods can be divided into subjective sensory evaluation and objective instrumental tests. Subjective sensory evaluation methods are based on personal observations of experienced discriminators using the senses of sight, touch, and smell to evaluate food. Objective instrumental control involves testing and analyzing food products using various types of testing equipment [2]. Traditional instrumental analysis methods are often complex, time-consuming, and have limited detection capabilities. As a result, the number of studies aimed at developing intelligent, efficient, and precise techniques for detecting food analysis has multiplied [12; 13]. Appearance, odor, taste, and texture are commonly used to assess changes in food quality and safety.