Comparative evaluation of methods for the detection of 2-alkylcyclobutanones as indicators for irradiation treatment of cashew nuts and nutmeg

Irradiation of food products and ingredients must be indicated by proper labelling. For checking compliance with legislation a number of analytical methods have been elaborated and standardised by the European Committee for Standardization (CEN). Among this suite of methods is EN 1785:2003 Detection of irradiated food containing fat - Gas chromatographic/mass spectrometric analysis of 2-alkylcyclobutanones. The standard specifies a method for the identification of irradiation treatment of food containing fat. This study evaluated the appropriateness of EN 1785:2003 for the detection of radiolysis products in cashew nuts and nutmeg and confirmed its suitabilit to detect irradiation of cashew nut samples at average absorbed doses of 1 kGray and above. For nutmeg the sensitivity of EN 1785:2003 for the detection of radiolysis products is lower, which might be caused by matrix interference. Nutmeg is not only a high fat product, but contains essential oils in addition, which might interfere. An alternative method was developed, which is based on matrix solid phase extraction and subsequent separation and detection of oxime derivatives of 2-alkylcyclobutanones by high performance – high resolution mass spectrometry. It is more rapid, less resource consuming, and more sensitive than EN 1785:2003. This method allowed detection of 2-alkylcyclobutanones in cashew nuts irradiated at 100 Gray and in nutmeg irradiated at 400 Gray. This is an improvement in sensitivity by a factor of 5-10 compared to EN 1785:2003. None of the 26 cashew nut and 14 nutmeg samples purchased in different EU Member States contained traces of 2-alkylcyclobutanones.

BREIDBACH Andreas;  ULBERTH Franz; 

2016-01-21

ELSEVIER SCI LTD

JRC97458

0308-8146,   

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308814616300322,    https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC97458,   

10.1016/j.foodchem.2016.01.032,