Abstract
Suet oil (SO) has been used commonly for food and medicine preparation. The determination of its elemental composition has became an important challenge for human safety and health owing to its possible contents of heavy metals or other elements. In this study, ultrawave single reaction chamber microwave digestion (Ultrawave) and inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) analysis was performed to determine 14 elements (Pb, As, Hg, Cd, Fe, Cu, Mn, Ti, Ni, V, Sr, Na, Ka and Ca) in SO samples. Furthermore, the multielemental content of 18 SO samples, which represented three different sources in China: Qinghai, Anhui and Jiangsu, were evaluated and compared. The optimal ultrawave digestion conditions, namely, the optimal time (35 min), temperature (210 °C) and pressure (90 bar), were screened by Box-Behnken design (BBD). Eighteen samples were successfully classified into three groups by principal component analysis (PCA) according to the contents of 14 elements. The results showed that all SO samples were rich in elements, but with significant differences corresponding to different origins. The outliers and majority of SO could be discriminated by PCA according to the multielemental content profile. The results highlighted that the element distribution was associated with the origins of SO samples. The proposed ultrawave digestion system was quite efficient and convenient, which could be mainly attributed to its high pressure and special high-throughput for the sample digestion procedure. Our established method could be useful for the quality control and standardization of elements in SO samples and products.
Highlights
Inorganic elements, important chemical components of natural foods and their products, have been found to play an important role in human safety and health
The outliers and majority of Suet oil (SO) could be discriminated by principal component analysis (PCA) according to the multielemental content profile
Ultrawave digestion can be used to save consumables costs and sample pretreatment time owing to its higher performance and throughput
Summary
Important chemical components of natural foods and their products, have been found to play an important role in human safety and health. Based on emerging evidence heavy metals and metalloids, especially Pb, As, Hg and Cd, have attracted increasing attention due to their bioavailability and toxicity These elements may be introduced into the food chain in various ways, including contamination during cultivation, processing, and storage. Microwave-assisted digestion including closed vessel systems has been widely used as an original way to pretreat samples for ICP-MS analysis [19,20]. Blanks are significantly lower than with closed vessel digestion, since less solution transfer occurs, quartz vials can be used and digestion acid volumes are lower It has been used widely in the food and medicine industries, to the best of our knowledge, the standardization of SO still remains a challenge due to contamination or purposeful adulteration with other oils. Principal component analysis (PCA) was performed to evaluate and classify the eighteen batches of SO according to the detected contents of the various elements
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