Concentration and probabilistic health risk of polychlorinated biphenyls in cheese samples collected from Tehran, Iran

Abstract

This study focused on the measurement of non‐dioxin‐like polychlorinated biphenyls (NDL‐PCBs) in cheese samples (traditional and commercial cheese) by a modified QuEChERS (quick, easy, cheap, effective, rugged and safe) method by gas chromatography (GC) coupled with triple‐quadrupole (QqQ) tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS). The recovery of NDL‐PCBs was in the range of 93.22–109.19%, and relative standard deviation (RSD) was in the range of 4.24–9.04%. Also, the limit of detections (LODs) and the limit of quantifications (LOQs) for the PCB analytes ranged from 0.04 to 0.14 ng/g and 0.120 to 0.420 ng/g respectively. The results showed that the mean level of Ʃ6‐NDL‐PCBs in cheese samples was 9.83 ± 3.12 ng/g and maximum was 18.27 ng/g fat, which was lower than the European Union (EU) standard levels (40 ng/g fat in dairy products). The estimated daily intake of 6 NDL‐PCBs through cheese consumption was lower than the tolerable daily intake. Incremental lifetime cancer risk for children and adults due to six PCBs was 7.03E‐6 and 3.14E‐5, which was lower than the acceptable risk level (10−4).