[Fast screening of the artificial dyes in wine by liquid chromatography/hybrid linear ion trap-orbitrap mass...

A fast screening method was established for the simultaneous determination of 15 water-soluble artificial dyes in wine by liquid chromatography/hybrid linear ion trap orbitrap mass spectrometry (LC/LTQ-orbitrap MS) based on a self-established mass spectral database. The confirmations of these target dyes were processed by the accurate mass numbers, and the MS(2) spectra marching to the self-established mass spectral database. The dyes in wine were purified by an anion-exchange column and separated by a BEH Phenyl column, then identified and quantified by LTQ-orbitrap MS. The results showed that the method detection limits of the target compounds were ranged from 0.00040 to 0.18 mg/L, and the average recoveries of the 15 compounds spiked at three concentrations were in the range of 43.1% - 127% with the relative standard deviations less than 10%. The spiked sample had the matching scores higher than 98% to the second order mass spectra of the standard compounds in the database. The method is also suitable for screening the 15 dyes in wine without reference standards.