###### Abstract  
Volatile compounds are essential for food organoleptic characteristics and of great utility for the food industry as potential markers for authenticity purposes (e.g., variety, geographical origin, adulteration). The aim of this study was to determine the characteristic volatile compounds of strawberry samples grown in a soilless system by using headspace solid phase micro-extraction coupled with gas chromatography and to investigate the influence of cultivar (Festival, Candonga, Camarosa) on this volatile profile. We observed that Festival and, to a lesser extent, Candonga varieties were characterized by the richest aroma-related profiles, including higher levels of esters, furanones and terpen. In particular, methyl butyrate, hexyl hexanoate, linalool, geraniol and furanenol were the most abundant aromatic compounds detected in the three varieties of strawberries. Complementarily, the application of pattern recognition chemometric approaches, including principal component analysis and linear discriminant analysis, demonstrated that concentrations of specific volatiles can be employed as chemical descriptors to discriminate between strawberry cultivars. Accordingly, geraniol and hexyl hexanoate were found to be the most significant volatiles for the discrimination of strawberry varieties.  
strawberry; volatile profile; variety; soilless system +
Footnote †: journal: _foods_  
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regions of Spain, France and Italy due to the phase out of methyl bromide, a broad-spectrum soil fumigant traditionally employed for strawberry production [15]. In previous studies, the nutritional characteristics of strawberries grown in soilless systems have been compared with those cultivated in soil crops [16], and differences in color and phenolic content among five strawberry varieties cultivated in two soilless substrates have also been evaluated [17; 18]. More recently, great efforts have been made to characterize the chemical composition of soilless-grown strawberry and to elucidate the effect of cultivar and agronomic practices by applying complementary analytical approaches, such as metabolomics [19], polyphenolic analysis [20], and the multi-targeted profiling of different nutrients and food components (e.g., sugars, organic acids, minerals) [21; 22; 23]. In this context, the study of the volatile fraction from strawberry cultivars grown in soilless systems could be of great interest for the food industry to select optimal breeding and cultivation strategies aimed to produce higher quality fruits with an enhanced aroma. Furthermore, these volatile compounds might serve as markers for detecting adulteration [24] and to predict the shelf life of derived food products and establish the best commercial storage conditions to preserve their quality [25].  
Considering this lack of information about the chemical composition of strawberries grown in soilless systems and the effect of cultivar, the aim of this work was to investigate the characteristic volatile profile of strawberries cultivated using this non-conventional crop system. For this purpose, an analytical method based on headspace solid phase micro-extraction (HS-SPME) and gas chromatography (GC) was applied to investigate the effect of cultivar (Festival, Candonga, Camarosa) on these aromatic compounds. Then, two complementary chemometrics approaches were employed, namely principal component analysis and linear discriminant analysis.