Analytical Strategies and Method Validation to Access the Bioavailability of Essential Elements and Arsenic from Raw and Cooked Fish and Shrimp

Abstract

The bioavailability of essential and toxic elements in raw/cooked tilapia and shrimp was estimated using in vitro gastrointestinal digestion followed by the Caco-2 cell model to simulate the human intestinal barrier. Analytical strategies such as aerosol dilution, collision cell, and matrix-matching calibration were successfully explored for multielement quantification using ICP OES and ICP-MS. From Caco-2 cell bioassays, the estimated bioavailability values ranged from 1.4% (Fe) to 15.2% (Cu) in tilapia and from 0.2% (Fe) to 10.7% (P) in shrimp. Air-frying and oven-baking methods decreased tilapia’s Mg, P, S, Cu, and Fe bioavailability. Contrarily, the bioavailability of essential elements (except Mn) in shrimp seemed to increase after air-frying. Arsenic bioavailability in cooked shrimp was significantly higher than in the raw sample (1.9 vs 5.7%) but fortunately below the limit allowed by legislation. In spite of the complexity of basal solutions from the cell-based bioassays, the applied analytical strategies allowed the accurate quantification of the bioavailable fractions by ICP-based methods.