FAST AND SIMPLE METHOD FOR SIMULTANEOUS DETERMINATION OF BENZOIC ACID AND ACESULFAME-K IN SOFT DRINKS BY HIGH PERFORMANCE LIQUID CHROMATOGRAPHY-DIODE ARRAY DETECTOR: METHOD VALIDATION AND UNCERTAINTY EVALUATION

Abstract

Classified as food additives, the use of benzoic acid and acesulfame K to preserve foods is finite due to health and environmentreason.In this study, anefficient and fast method for simultaneous determination of benzoic acid and acesulfame-K in soft drinks was validated using high performance liquid chromatography with diode array detector (HPLC-DAD) on a C18 column. The method showed results satisfaction as the coefficient determination for benzoic acid and acesulfame-K were 0.9998 and 0.9991 respectively. The LOD for both compounds found at 0.02 mg/kg and the LOQ were found at 0.07 and 0.06 mg/kg for benzoic acid and acesulfame-K respectively. The recovery studies proved that the method has a good recovery ranging from 96103% for both benzoic acid and acesulfame-K with %RSD varies from 1.6 - 4.6% at different concentrations. The validated method then applied to the inter-laboratory comparison sample conducted by the National Quality Control Laboratory for Drug and Food (NQCLDF), Indonesia, using traceable standard reference materials. Uncertainty evaluation using bottom-up approach showed that the method has reasonable uncertainty value with uncertainty budget derived from weighing process, recovery studies, method precision, calibration curve and standard solution. The uncertainty value (k=2, in confidence level 95%) for benzoic acid was found to be 4% at reported concentration of 343 mg/kg and for acesulfame-K was found to be 6.5% at reported concentration of 195 mg/kg. In conclusion, the validated method offered a simple and fast method, as well as economical reagents consumption indicating its possible application as an alternative method for a routine analysis.