Comprehensive detection of 120 additives in food using nontargeted MS data acquisition

Che-Lun Hsu, Department of Food Science, National Taiwan Ocean University, Keelung City, Taiwan
Mingchih Fang, Department of Food Science, National Taiwan Ocean University, Keelung City, TaiwanFollow
Hui-Chun Tseng, Division of Research and Analysis, Taiwan Food and Drug Administration, Taipei City,Taiwan
Ya-Tze Lin, Division of Research and Analysis, Taiwan Food and Drug Administration, Taipei City,Taiwan
Su-Hsiang Tseng, Division of Research and Analysis, Taiwan Food and Drug Administration, Taipei City,Taiwan
Der-Yuan Wang, Division of Research and Analysis, Taiwan Food and Drug Administration, Taipei City,Taiwan
Deng-Fwu Hwang, Department of Food Science, National Taiwan Ocean University, Keelung City, Taiwan

Abstract

The compliance assessment on the labeling of food additives is a hard job, because there are nearly thousand legal food additives can be used in food, and countless illegal additives must also deal with. This study developed a nontargeted data acquisition screening method based on liquid chromatography high resolution mass spectrometry (HRMS) in which a precursor ion and two product ions of each analyte are able to be recorded. The high throughput screening method worked as foodomics that characterized and identified every food components as long as they were ionized in terms of theory. The data acquisition method called data independent acquisition (DIA) was achieved by a full scan form m/z 70-1,050, and then followed wide window fragmentations of product ions recording. A full scan and the followed fragmentations generated 21 spectra in 2.6 s contributed about 6 data points for a typical 0.2-0.3 min width peak in HPLC. A detection database list of 120 additives included 79 colorants, 13 sweeteners, 12 preservatives and 7 antioxidants was established. Thirty-three commercial samples including beverages, candies, and sauces were surveyed for testing additives. Sweeteners (rebaudioside A) and flavoring agents (malic acid and fumaric acid) were found the most under declared additives. HPLC column often do not provide adequate retention for highly polar compounds such as organic acids (flavoring agents). In this study they were coeluted, but were able to be separated and determined by HRMS worked as the secondary separation tool. The surveillance results showed there is still room for food manufacturers to improve the connection between their product information and consumers.

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Recommended Citation

Hsu, Che-Lun; Fang, Mingchih; Tseng, Hui-Chun; Lin, Ya-Tze; Tseng, Su-Hsiang; Wang, Der-Yuan; and Hwang, Deng-Fwu (2021) "Comprehensive detection of 120 additives in food using nontargeted MS data acquisition," Journal of Food and Drug Analysis: Vol. 29 : Iss. 3 , Article 3.
Available at: https://doi.org/10.38212/2224-6614.3366