Determination of Sucrose Esters of Fatty Acids by High Performance Liquid Chromatography

Abstract

A sensitive method was developed for the quantitative determination of sucrose mono-and di-fatty acid esters (SuE) in foods by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The SuE were extracted with tetrahydrofuran from foods and purified by silica gel column chromatography. The isolated SuE were derivatized with 3, 5-dinitrobenzoyl chloride (DNBC) and the reaction products were dissolved in a mixture of tetrahydrofuran and acetonitrile (1:1). A portion of this solution was injected into an Inertsil C8 column and eluted with a linear gradient elution system from 15% water in acetonitrile to 100% acetonitrile over 30min, then hold for 20min.Each SuE was detected with a UV detector set at 230nm. SuE in various kinds of foods could be selectively detected without interference on the HPLC. All peaks of mono-and diesters having C12, C14, C16, C18 C16-C16, C16-C18 and C18-C18 carbon chains could be well separated. The recoveries of SuE added to margarine, ice cream, cookies, curry roux and coffee whitener were more than 80% for the monoesters and more than 75% for the diesters. The detection limit was 0.001% for each SuE.