Development and Validation of a Quantitative Method for Multiple Allergen Detection in Food Using Concatemer-Based...

Area of Science:

• Food Science
• Analytical Chemistry
• Mass Spectrometry

Background:

• Accurate food labeling is crucial for protecting consumers with food allergies.
• Allergen contamination is a risk throughout food production.
• There is a need for sensitive, robust methods to detect multiple food allergens.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method.
• To detect and quantify hazelnuts, peanuts, milk, and eggs in processed foods.

Main Methods:

• Utilized incurred test materials (cookies, chocolates) for development and validation.
• Employed standard addition strategy with qualified reference materials for quantification.
• Used a stable isotope-labeled concatemer as an internal standard.

Main Results:

• Developed and validated a method targeting 19 allergen-specific peptides across two laboratories.
• Achieved AOAC INTERNATIONAL performance requirements for precision and recovery.
• Quantification limits met the VITAL® Program Version 3.0 action levels.

Conclusions:

• A robust method for detecting and quantifying multiple food allergens was successfully developed and validated.
• The method offers sufficient sensitivity to protect allergic consumers.
• Standardization and harmonization in food allergen detection were achieved through incurred materials, certified reference materials, and cross-lab validation.