Determination of hydroxycarboxylic acids in food products by capillary electrophoresis

A procedure for the capillary-electrophoretic determination of lactic, malic, tartaric, and citric acids in food products was developed. The use of 3-nitrobenzoic acid as a light-absorbing component of the running buffer was proposed for the indirect photometric detection of these substances. This considerably increased the determination sensitivity (up to n × 10 μg/L), as compared with currently available analogs. The composition of the running buffer was optimized: 3-nitrobenzoic acid, 10 mM; cetyltrimethylammonium bromide, 0.5 mM; EDTA, 0.1 mM; and monoethanolamine, to pH 5.3. The procedure was tested with the samples of food products: fruits, juices, nectars, wines, beer, etc. The accuracy of the analytical results was confirmed by the standard addition method.