Highly sensitive qualitative and quantitative detection of saturated fatty aldehydes in edible vegetable oils using a “turn-on” fluorescent probe by high performance liquid chromatography

Abstract

A new turn-on fluorescent probe, based on a hydrazine group placed in the meso-position of the BODIPY molecule, was synthesized. It was then used for detecting long-chain fatty aldehydes, which can be harmful to human health, in edible vegetable oils. In acetonitrile, the probe produced strong “turn on” and 100-fold fluorescence enhancement with high sensitivity and rapid response to saturated fatty aldehydes. A highly sensitive detection method for long-chain fatty aldehydes was established using pre-column derivation fluorescence procedure by high-performance liquid chromatography. The chromatographic method established provided satisfactory precision (1.91%–5.93%), good linearity (R2 ≥ 0.999), an acceptable accuracy (83.7%–108%) and a low limit of detection (6.4–12.4 ng/mL). The experimental results indicated that the probe could qualitatively and quantitatively detect six fatty aldehydes in vegetable oils, thus providing the potential for use in routine analysis for identifying the type of vegetable oil and for controlling its quality and safety.