Determination of 13 Phenolic Compounds in Rice Wine by High-Performance Liquid Chromatography

Abstract

Rice wines are widely consumed by the general public in Asian countries, while comprehensive studies focused on the individual phenolic compounds in rice wines are limited. A rapid method for simultaneous determination of 13 phenolic compounds in rice wines by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) was developed and validated, and the phenolic compounds in commercial rice wine samples (Chinese rice wine, Japanese sake, and Korean makgeolli) were determined in this paper. The identified compounds contained gallic acid (GA), protocatechuic acid (PRCA), vanillic acid (VA), syringic acid (SRA), caffeic acid (CA), ferulic acid (FA), p-coumaric acid (pCA), sinapic acid (SA), chlorogenic acid (CHA), (+)-catechin (CAT), (−)-epicatechin (EPI), quercetin (QUE), and rutin (RUT). Phenolics were separated with a C18 reversed-phase column at 38 °C by gradient elution using 3 % acetic acid aqueous solution (solvent A) and acetonitrile (solvent B) (0 min, 5 % B; 5 min, 8 % B; 10 min, 15 % B; 20 min, 25 % B; and 25 min, 5 % B) as the mobile phase at 280 nm with flow rate of 1.0 mL min−1. With direct injection of rice wine samples, the chromatograms of all analytes were observed within 20 min, all calibration curves were linear (R 2 > 0.995) within the range, limits of detection (LOD) ranged from 0.02 to 0.06 μg mL−1, and good recoveries (88.07–106.80 %) and precision (relative standard deviation (RSD) < 5.36 % ) were obtained for all compounds. This method was applied to quantify phenolic compounds in commercial rice wine samples (Chinese rice wine, Japanese sake, and Korean makgeolli), and good separation peaks were observed and catechin was the predominant phenolic in the samples. The average values of total phenolic contents of the three groups of rice wine were significantly different (p < 0.01). In conclusion, this procedure can be used to determine the phenolic compounds in various types of rice wines, as well as to characterize and differentiate rice wine samples.