- P-ISSN 1225-0163
- E-ISSN 2288-8985
Isotope dilution mass spectrometry (ID-MS) based on liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC/MS/MS) was developed for the accurate determination of sorbic acid in tea-drink. An isotope analogue of sorbic acid, 13C2-sorbic acid, was obtained by custom synthesis. MS was operated in the negative mode with selected reaction monitoring (SRM) mode of [M-H]- → [M-CO2H]- channel at m/z 111 → 67 for sorbic acid and at m/z 113 → 68 for its isotope analogue. Chromatographic separation was accomplished with a C18column and an isocratic mobile phase of 55% of 50 mM ammonium acetate (pH 4.5) and 45% of methanol. Homogeneous reference materials were prepared for validation of this method, including repeatability and reproducibility tests, by fortifying tea-drink with sorbic acid in our laboratory. Repeatability and reproducibility studies showed that the ID-LC/MS method is a reliable and reproducible method which provides less than 3.8%of relative standard deviation (RSD) for the analysis of sorbic acid.