Correlation of chemical components with overall sensory quality of tobacco leaves in south Anhui

To establish the relationships of chemical components with sensory quality of flue-cured tobacco from south Anhui tobacco growing areas, 119 tobacco samples were collected from nine counties/districts there, and comprehensive statistical and correlation analyses of the chemical components and sensory quality of the leaf samples were conducted. The results showed that:1) The average values of chemical components in these flue-cured tobacco were basically within the appropriate ranges required by quality tobacco leaves. 2) The sensory quality and burnt-sweetness character of tobacco positively correlated to total sugar, reducing sugar and the ratios of reducing sugar/total alkaloid, total sugar/total alkaloid and total nitrogen/nicotine in a statistically significant manner, while an extreme negative correlation existed for nicotine, total nitrogen, potassium, chlorine, and Shmuck value. 3) There was significant positive correlation between the burnt-sweetness character and the scores of overall sensory evaluation.