A rapid tool for determination of titanium dioxide content in white chickpea samples

Titanium dioxide (TiO₂) is a widely used additive in foods. However, in the scientific community there is an ongoing debate on health concerns about TiO₂. The main goal of this study is to determine TiO₂ content by using laser induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS). To this end, different amounts of TiO₂ was added to white chickpeas and analyzed by using LIBS. Calibration curve was obtained by following Ti emissions at 390.11nm for univariate calibration, and partial least square (PLS) calibration curve was obtained by evaluating the whole spectra. The results showed that Ti calibration curve at 390.11nm provides successful determination of Ti level with 0.985 of R² and 33.9ppm of limit of detection (LOD) value, while PLS has 0.989 of R² and 60.9ppm of LOD. Furthermore, commercial white chickpea samples were used to validate the method, and validation R² for simple calibration and PLS were calculated as 0.989 and 0.951, respectively.