Heartwood - valuable natural 

resource for building 

When heartwood is used in construc-

tions where natural decay resistance 

suffice, it is possible to avoid unnec-

essary use of impregnated timber. 

The technology under development 

will contribute to quality control of 

wood raw material.  

Improved seeds for forest 

regeneration 

With this new technology, heartwood 

stilbenes could be measured from the 

seed producing trees located in seed 

orchards. Seeds collected from the 

selected trees would offer forest re-

generation material having high po-

tential for stilbene production in their 

heartwood when grown up.   

Novel products of forest 

bioeconomy 

Bioeconomy is based on the intelli-

gent utilization of renewable natural 

resources. To fulfil the expectations, 

material-efficient production tech-

niques, technologies and services are 

needed. The technology under devel-

opment will contribute to new and 

improved products in forest-based 

industries.  

 

Scots pine heartwood 

Scots pine, Pinus sylvestris L., resists 

decay due to its phenolic extractives, 

stilbenes. Among the individual trees 

there is wide variation in stilbene 

content. Intelligent exploitation of 

heartwood requires fast and reliable 

measurement technology to sort and 

select heartwood material based on 

stilbene content. 

 

 

The higher the stilbene concentration is, the 

brighter is the blue colour, and the higher is the 

measured peak of fluorescence. 

Under UV-light, stilbene-containing wood emits 

light blue colour, the intensity of which could be 

measured. 

Naturally extractive-rich Scots pine heartwood 

would be suitable for the decks of the bridges 

or for terraces. 

The aim of this project is to 

develop and experiment a 

fast, cost-effective and reli-

able technology to measure 

the extractive content of 

Scots pine heartwood. 

UV-FLUORESCENCE 
SPECTROSCOPY IN MEASURING 
STILBENE CONTENT  

Anni Harju: anni.harju@luke.fi, Susanna Pulkka: susanna.pulkka@luke.fi, Martti Venäläinen: martti.venalainen@luke.fi 

Natural Resources Institute Finland, Bio-based Business and Industry, Finlandiantie 18, 58450 Punkaharju 

 

Anni Harju, Susanna Pulkka and Martti Venäläinen 

Punkaharju Unit 

Stilbene content ~ 10 mg/g  

Stilbene content ~ 15 mg/g  

Stilbene content ~ 20 mg/g  

Stilbene content ~ 25 mg/g  

Collaborators 
3K-Factory of Electronics: Elmar 

Bernhardt, Henri Montonen 

- Development of technical setup  

Mikkeli University of Applied Sciences: 

Yrjö Hiltunen 

- Expert on data management 

Luke: Jukka Antikainen, Tarja Tapanila, 

Risto Korpinen, Piia Kinnunen 

- Software development, stilbene 

extraction and chemical analyses 

 

 

Project activities 

Technical setup, running software and 

procedures to measure phenolic 

stilbenes from Scots pine heartwood 

will be developed during the two-year 

project in 2015-2016.  

The measurement procedures will be 

tested using samples from a forest 

tree breeding material. At the same 

time, it is possible to prepare the 

equipment for wider use. 

 

 

Funding of the project 

The research and development 

activities are mainly funded by the 

European Regional Development 

Fund (ERDF), the Region of South 

Savo. Also Savonlinna Business 

Services Ltd, Savonlinna City and 

Luke participate in funding.  

 

Photo:  

Eija Matikainen 

Tarja Salminen 

Kean-Jin Lim  

Martti Venäläinen 

mailto:anni.harju@luke.fi
mailto:susanna.pulkka@luke.fi
mailto:martti.venalainen@luke.fi