Development and validation of an HPLC analytical method for preservatives in musk

Musk has long been recognized and effectively utilized as an animal-derived natural drug in traditional Korean herbal medicine. This study was fulfilled to develop a HPLC method to analyze sorbic acid, dehydroacetic acid, ethylparaben, and methylparaben as contaminants, which have been widely used as food additives but not been known to contain naturally in musk. All musk samples were obtained from species certified Moschus moschiferus, and basically utilized a general test for preservatives in Korean Food Codex. The method validation was done for linearity, LOD, LOQ, accuracy, precision, and system suitability in accordance with MFDS guidelines for pharmaceutical validation. The findings indicated that LOD varied from 0.13 to 0.36 mg/mL, LOQ ranged from 0.40 to 1.10 mg/mL, and the coefficient of determination (R2) for linearity exceeded 0.99. The recovery rates for four preservatives varied from 73.1% to 116.8%, while the precision and system suitability fell within the range of 0.20% to 0.32%, satisfying the validation criteria. In addition, none of the four preservatives were detected in 12 musk samples collected from various regions and age [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ]. The HPLC analytical method developed in this study is expected to improve musk quality control by allowing the detection of deliberately added preservatives. Acknowledgment This research was supported by a grant (22201MFDS144 and 25201MFDS002) from Ministry of Food and Drug Safety in 2023-2025. Publication History Article published online: 05 March 2026 © 2026. Thieme. All rights reserved. Georg Thieme Verlag KG Oswald-Hesse-Straße 50, 70469 Stuttgart, Germany