Determination of eight antifungal drugs in mutton by QuEChERS coupled with ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry

Abstract

A method for the simultaneous determination of eight antifungal drugs in mutton was developed using QuEChERS combined with ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS/MS). The samples were shaken with acetonitrile containing 2.0% (v/v) formic acid, and then subjected to QuEChERS purification. The residual targets were analyzed on an Atiantis® T3 column (100 mm×2.1 mm, 3 μm) with gradient elution using acetonitrile-0.1% (v/v) formic acid aqueous solution as the mobile phase. All the analytes were effectively separated and cleaned up within 9 min, and were finally detected by UPLC-MS/MS with ESI+ ionization in multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode. All the eight antifungal drugs showed a good linear trend in the range of 0.2-50 μg/L, with the correlation coefficient (R2) greater than 0.99. The limits of detection (LODs) and limits of quantification (LOQs) were 0.3-3.0 μg/kg and 1.0-10.0 μg/kg, respectively. The calibration curves were used in the analysis to reduce the negative influence of matrix effects. The average recoveries at different levels (low, medium, and high) for all the analytes ranged from 70.3% to 118.4%, with the relative standard deviations of 0.4%-4.3% (n=6). The developed method shows excellent recovery and stable repeatability, and is suitable for the determination of the antifungal drugs in mutton.