Liquid chromatography/mass spectrometric determination of patulin in apple juice using atmospheric pressure photoionization.

This paper describes a comparison between atmospheric pressure chemical ionization (APCI) and the recently introduced atmospheric pressure photoionization (APPI) technique for the liquid chromatography/mass spectrometric (LC/MS) determination of patulin in clear apple juice. A column switching technique for on-line extraction of clear apple juice was developed. The parameters investigated for the optimization of APPI were the ion source parameters fragmentor voltage, capillary voltage, and vaporizer temperature, and also mobile phase composition and flow rate. Furthermore, chemical noise and signal suppression of analyte signals due to sample matrix interference were investigated for both APCI and APPI. The results indicated that APPI provides lower chemical noise and signal suppression in comparison with APCI. The linear range for patulin in apple juice (correlation coefficient >0.999) was 0.2-100 ng mL(-1). Mean recoveries of patulin in three apple juices ranged from 94.5 to 103.2%, and the limit of detection (S/N = 3), repeatability and reproducibility were 1.03-1.50 ng mL(-1), 3.9-5.1% and 7.3-8.2%, respectively. The total analysis time was 10.0 min. Copyright 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.