Determination of Polymer Additives-Antioxidants, Ultraviolet Stabilizers, Plasticizers and Photoinitiators in Plastic Food Package by Accelerated Solvent Extraction Coupled with High-Performance Liquid Chromatography

Abstract

An analytical method for the quantitative determination of 4 antioxidants, 9 ultraviolet (UV) stabilizers, 12 phthalate plasticizers and 2 photoinitiators in plastic food package using accelerated solvent extraction (ASE) coupled with high-performance liquid chromatography-photodiode array detector (HPLC-PDA) has been developed. Parameters affecting the efficiency in the process such as extraction and chromatographic conditions were studied in order to determine operating conditions. The analytical method of ASE-HPLC showed good linearity with good correlation coefficients (R ≥ 0.9833). The limits of detection and quantification were between 0.03 and 0.30 μg mL-1 and between 0.10 and 1.00 μg mL-1 for 27 analytes. Average spiked recoveries for most analytes in samples were >70.4% at 10, 20 and 40 μg g-1 spiked levels, except UV-9 and Irganox 1010 (58.6 and 64.0% spiked at 10 μg g-1, respectively), the relative standard deviations were in the range from 0.4 to 15.4%. The methodology has been proposed for the analysis of 27 polymer additives in plastic food package.