Abstract:Aroma is one of the most important factors to evaluate the quality of tea. In order to systematically analyze the difference of aroma components in new and aged Dahongpao oolong teas, and thus provided a scientific basis for storing Dahongpao teas, headspace-solid-phase microextraction combined with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (HS-SPME-GC-MS) and gas chromatography-olfactometry(GC-O) were mainly used in this study. A total of 185 aroma compounds were identified from new Dahongpao and aged Dahongpao oolong teas by HS-SPME-GC-MS, and 45 aroma-active components were identified by using GC-O method. Partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) and nonparametric test indicated that there were 31 key aroma compounds with statistical differences between the two groups (P<0.05). Whereafter, the key aroma compounds with statistical differences and aroma-active components in new and aged Dahongpao were further investigated by combining the peak areas and aroma intensity (AI). Results showed that the peak areas of 2-acetylfuran, 3,5-dimethyl-2-ethylpyrazine, linalool, phenylethyl alcohol, phenethyl acetate, indole and hexyl hexanoate had the same trend as those of aroma intensity. Therefore, these key differential aroma-active components have important contribution for distinguishing the aroma between the new and aged Dahongpao oolong teas, which present a potential applications in the identification of aged Wuyi rock teas. The results of this study provide some technical references for the scientific evaluation of Dahongpao aroma and the discrimination of "new and aged" teas.