Green, Rapid, Robust Determination of Aspartame in Beverages by High-Performance Liquid Chromatography-Evaporative Light Scattering Detection (HPLC-ELSD): Method Development and Validation

OpenAlex İngilizce

In recent years, eco-friendly approaches and reduction in the use of hazardous solvents have become important in applications of routine high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). Despite its various health side effects, aspartame (ASP) is a widely used artificial sweetener due to its high sweetness and low cost. In this study, a green, eco-friendly, cost effective, rapid, robust, and simple high-performance liquid chromatography-evaporative light scattering detection (HPLC-ELSD) method has been developed and validated for the determination of ASP in beverages. Separation was conducted isocratically on a C18 (4.6 × 150 mm, 3.5 µm) column; the mobile phase consisted of 80:20 water:ethanol at a flow rate of 1 mL min−1. The drift tube of evaporative light scattering detection (ELSD) temperature was adjusted to 50 °C and the nitrogen pressure was adjusted to 350 kPa. The HPLC-ELSD method provided a limit of detection and a limit of quantification of 0.33–0.99 µg mL−1, with recoveries of 99.4 ± 0.68% and 102.8 ± 0.17%, respectively. The precision of the method as the relative standard deviation was less than 1%. The method permitted the determination of ASP within 8 min using only 6.4 mL water and 1.6 mL ethanol. This study shows that the developed HPLC-ELSD method is suitable for determination of ASP in the food industry.