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Determination of Arsenic in Fruit Juices Using Inductively Coupled Plasma Tandem Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS/MS)

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Abstract

Reports from the US media have raised the attention towards a possible contamination of apple juices by As. The study here described presents the development of an analytical procedure using inductively coupled plasma tandem mass spectrometry (ICP-MS/MS) for determination of As in apple and orange juices commercialized in the Tetra Pack® package. The microwave-assisted acid digestion of juice was carried out using closed vessels and 2 mol/L HNO3 plus H2O2. These conditions are favorable for a better analytical blank control. Suitable recoveries were reached when promoting reaction with O2 inside the octopole reaction system (ORS3), and the monitoring of 75As16O+ significantly improved the accuracy of the analysis reaching a limit of detection of 0.013 μg/L. Recoveries varied from 88 to 109 % in the MS/MS mass-shift mode. The As concentrations determined in fruit juices ranged from 0.126 to 1.45 μg/L, and they were significantly lower than the maximum tolerable limits imposed by the US and Brazilian legislations. Thus, ICP-MS/MS operated in the reaction mode was an effective instrumental strategy for overcoming spectral interferences, such as 40Ar35Cl+, in As determination as 75As16O+ and allowed the accurate determination of As at trace levels.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq, grant 303107/2013-8) and to the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES—grant 15/2104) for fellowships and financial support. We also would like to thank the equipment loan provided by the Agilent Technologies and Analitica/Thermo.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Group for Applied Instrumental Analysis, Department of Chemistry, Federal University of São Carlos, P.O. Box 676, São Carlos, SP, 13560-270, Brazil

    Fernanda C. Pinheiro, Clarice D. B. Amaral & Joaquim A. Nóbrega

  2. Agilent Technologies, São Paulo, SP, Brazil

    Daniela Schiavo

Authors
  1. Fernanda C. Pinheiro
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  2. Clarice D. B. Amaral
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  3. Daniela Schiavo
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  4. Joaquim A. Nóbrega
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Fernanda C. Pinheiro.

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Funding

This study was funded by the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) (grant 303107/2013-8) and the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) (grant 15/2104). We also would like to thank the equipment loan provided by the Agilent Technologies.

Conflict of Interest

Fernanda C. Pinheiro declares that she has no conflict of interest. Clarice D. B. Amaral declares that she has no conflict of interest. Daniela Schiavo declares that she has no conflict of interest despite working with Agilent in Brazil. Joaquim A. Nóbrega declares that he has no conflict of interest.

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This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Pinheiro, F.C., Amaral, C.D.B., Schiavo, D. et al. Determination of Arsenic in Fruit Juices Using Inductively Coupled Plasma Tandem Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS/MS) . Food Anal. Methods 10, 992–998 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12161-016-0663-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12161-016-0663-7

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