A novel capillary electrophoretic method for determining aliphatic aldehydes in food samples using 2-thiobarbituric...

Area of Science:

• Analytical Chemistry
• Food Science

Background:

• Aldehydes are common in food but often non-electroactive, posing analytical challenges.
• Sensitive and reliable methods are needed for aldehyde quantification in food matrices.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a novel capillary electrophoresis with amperometric detection (CE-AD) method.
• To enable sensitive determination of nine specific aldehydes in food samples.

Main Methods:

• Derivatization of nine aldehydes (formaldehyde to hexanal, glutaraldehyde, 2,3-butanedione, methylglyoxal) with 2-thiobarbituric acid (TBA).
• Separation and detection using capillary electrophoresis with amperometric detection (CE-AD).
• Optimization of derivatization and CE-AD experimental conditions.

Main Results:

• Successful conversion of non-electroactive aldehydes to electroactive adducts.
• Linear calibration plots (r² ≥ 0.9901) for aliphatic aldehydes from 0.083 to 15.0 mg/L.
• Low limits of detection (LODs) ranging from 0.008 to 0.074 mg/L.
• High recovery rates (82.8% to 123.8%) validating the method according to ICH guidelines.

Conclusions:

• The developed CE-AD method offers a reliable and sensitive approach for quantifying non-electroactive aldehydes in food.
• The technique utilizes relatively simple and inexpensive instrumentation.
• This method is suitable for analyzing low-molecular-mass monoaldehydes and dialdehydes in real food samples.