QUANTITATIVE DETERMINATION OF SYNTHETIC DYES IN FOOD PRODUCTS BY CAPILLARY ELECTROPHORESIS

The capillary electrophoresis method has been widely used in assessing the quality and safety of food products in Russia since the early 2000s. It is characterized by high accuracy and efficiency. In the practice of analytical control, capillary electrophoresis is used to determine the content of various cations and anions, organic acids, carbohydrates, vitamins, flavonoids, amino acids, preservatives, antioxidants, and synthetic dyes. The method is based on the electromigration of charged particles and, as a result, the separation of a complex multicomponent system in a quartz capillary. The bottom line is that after being fed to the capillaries prepared for analysis with a sample and a high-voltage eluent of the order of 20 kV, the components of the mixture move through the capillary at different speeds, reaching the detection zone at different times, depending on their nature. The determining factor for identifying the components being determined in this way is the peak exit time (migration time), and the peak area or height can be used as a quantitative estimate. Monitoring revealed the facts of falsification and excess of recommended dosages in various food products of the following synthetic dyes: red 2G (E128), Ponceau 4R (E124), tartrazine (E102), yellow “Sunset” (E110), indigocarmine (E132).