Application Notes: Food and Beverage

Blueberries are extracted into acidified methanol and analyzed for anthocyanins with a methanol/formic acid gradient via UHPLC/MS; four different Agilent ZORBAX RRHD stationary phases are quickly evaluated.

The types and amounts of sugar in animal feeds are as important as the amount of protein, minerals, and fats in the determination of nutritive value. We developed a simple and sensitive HPLC method for analyzing six sugars in animal feeds – sucrose, fructose, glucose, galactose, maltose, and lactose. Post-column derivatization reagents convert reducing and nonreducing sugars into fluorescent derivatives, which greatly improves the sensitivity and selectivity of the detection.

The iDQuant? Standards Kit for pesticide analysis of certified reference material (ISP Guide 34, IOS/IEC 17025, and ISO 9001:2008) includes 204 pesticides in 10 mixes at a concentration of 100 ?g/mL. This kit has been designed to eliminate the need to source pesticides individually, and measure each one manually. This allows users to setup, verify, and validate the performance of pesticide screening methods faster.

Bilberry (Vaccinium myrtillus L.) extracts are high in anthocyanin content and are widely used in nutritional supplements for improving visual acuity and treating circulatory disorders.

With more than 800 pesticides currently in use there is growing concern by government agencies about the effect of pesticide exposure on human health. While analytical techniques like GC or GC–MS have traditionally been used for pesticide analysis, LC–MS-MS has become the technique of choice due to speed, increased sensitivity, and reduced sample preparation. The following describes an LC–MS-MS method for screening of 534 pesticides in food products.

The popularity of diet soft drinks containing aspartame requires the analysis of thousands of samples for quality control purposes each year. These analyses are typically carried out with some fraction of organic modifier in the eluent, leading to the generation of thousands of gallons of hazardous organic waste. This note shows the "green" analysis of several commercial diet soft drinks in combination with a 100% water mobile phase.

In December 2008, the United States FDA recognized rebaudioside A (reb. A) purified from Stevia rebaudiana (Bertoni) as Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) as a sugar substitute in foods. As a result, stevia products have become popular tabletop and beverage sweeteners. Two steviol glycosides, stevioside and reb. A, are largely responsible for the desired sweet flavor, with reb. A preferred for sweeteners (1).

The method described employs a triple quadrupole mass spectrometer equipped with hyperbolic quadrupole rods for increased selectivity to prerform a trace level screening method for PCDD/Fs and PCBs and follows the well-established United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) Method 1613A.

The QuEChERS method of food sample preparation was used in conjunction with comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography time-of-flight mass spectrometry (GCxGC–TOFMS) to successfully identify PAH contaminants spiked in liquid commercial infant formula.

AGPC column and organic solvents are used to selectively pass large macro molecules such as lipids, resins, waxes, and other compounds from sample extracts while retaining the smaller target analyte molecules in the pores of the gel.

Sweeteners are low or zero-calorie sugar substitutes that are added in drinks to provide the sweet taste of sucrose or table sugar.

This application note demonstrates the extraction of sour cream, cream cheese, coffee creamer, heavy whipping cream, and low fat milk using an ASE 350 Accelerated Solvent Extractor technique developed by Dionex and compares results to the traditional Mojonnier technique.

A modified QuEChERS-type extraction method is used with an additional concentration step to detect 38 anthelmintic (nematicides, flukicides, endectocides) drug residues, consisting of benzimidazoles, avermectins, and flukicides in milk. UHPLC–MS-MS instrumentation detects most analytes at <1 µg/kg.

With Americans becoming increasingly health conscious and concerned with their exposure to chemicals, businesses have made movements to create more products that are safer for the consumer and the environment.

Aflatoxins occur naturally in peanuts, cottonseed, corn, and dried chili pepper, as well as many mixed or processed foods and feeds.

This article describes a straightforward ion chromatographic method that uses isocratic elution and pulsed amperometric detection (PAD) to sensitively determine water-soluble polyols and sugar alcohols as well as mono-, di- and oligosaccharides in essential and nonessential foodstuffs.

In food, organic acids originate from the natural biochemistry processes or are added as preservatives, acidulants and stabilizers.

Naringenin, a chiral flavonoid found in several fruit juices, is well known for its beneficial health-related properties, including antioxidant, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, and immunomodulating activities. The HPLC and supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC) enantioselective separation of (R,S)-Naringenin has been performed on both analytical and semi-preparative scale using an amylose derived RegisPack CSP.

There are currently several hormones and hormonelike agents with marked ability to improve the rate of growth and efficiency of feed intake for animals.

Furan is naturally occurring at low levels in many foods and drinks (1).

Coffees have aroma and taste based on where the beans are grown, roasting techniques, and flavor additives.

Agilent Poroshell 120, a superficially porous particle column, offers resolution and speed similar to columns packed with 1.8-µm totally porous particles, without generating high back pressure.

This paper describes the use of the AB SCIEX TripleTOFTM 5600 LC–MS-MS system for targeted and nontargeted screening for pesticide residue in food samples.

Aflatoxins occur naturally in peanuts, cottonseed, corn, and dried chili pepper, as well as many mixed or processed foods and feeds.

Whisky is a complex and variable material, the quality of which is affected by the raw materials and processing.

The QuEChERS approach is used for the extraction of 16 PAH compounds from fish with analysis by LC using fluorescence detection.

Grapefruit juice was analysed by gradient UHPLC for naringin - a major flavanoid in grapefruit juice that gives it its bitter taste. A ZORBAX Rapid resolution HD (RRHD) StableBond-C18 2.1 ? 150 mm, 1.8 ?m column was able to resolve over 60 peaks, including naringin in 7 minutes, and was re-equilibrated in just three minutes by operating at a high flow rate (0.8 mL/min). The high pressure generated (965 bar) is well within the 1200 bar operating range of the RRHD column and 1290 Infinity LC.

Pesticides are widely used in agriculture to protect crops and to improve efficiency of production. Consequently, governments, food producers and food retailers have a duty to ensure that any residues occurring in foods for human consumption are at or below statutory maximum residue levels (MRLs). Regulation EC 396/2005 adopted in the European Union sets MRLs for more than 500 different pesticides in over 300 different food commodities.

Lactose, a major disaccharide found in milk products, is catabolized into glucose and galactose by the enzyme lactase. Lactose-intolerant individuals have a lactase deficiency; therefore lactose is not completely catabolized.

This QuEChERS procedure is specifically adapted to cereal grain matrices such as corn, oats, rice, and wheat using UPLC-MS-MS and automated direct sample introduction GC-TOFMS to achieve good recoveries of 176 analytes.