Determination of Seven Biogenic Amines in Tuna with High-Performance Liquid Chromatography Coupled to Electrospray Ionization Ion Mobility Spectrometry

Tuna is one of the most popular fish and therefore among the most commercially valuable seafood. However, inadequate refrigeration during the whole supply chain causes serious economic loss and food poisoning. One important result of tuna spoilage is the accumulation of biogenic amines such as histamine, which can be used as a sensitive indicator for Tuna freshness. Thus, the development of rapid, sensitive, and economic analytical methods for biogenic amines in Tuna is highly desired. This research developed a method that combines high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and electrospray ionization ion mobility spectrometry (ESI-IMS) to detect 7 kinds of biogenic amines including tryptamine, tyramine, spermidine, cadaverine, beta-phenylethylamine, putrescine, and histamine in tuna. The limit of detections (LODs) for 7 biogenic amines are 0.01, 0.02, 0.02, 0.17, 0.03, 0.04, and 0.15 mg L-1 respectively. The linear range of histamine and spermidine is 2-100 mg kg(-1), and the linear range of other biogenic amines is 0.5-10 mg L-1. The recoveries of biogenic amines are between 69.39 and 112.65%. Compared to the traditional HPLC-based analytical method, the proposed method does not involve any derivatization steps, which greatly decreased the sample preparation time and cost. Another advantage of the developed method is the supplementary separation to the HPLC, in which coeluted biogenic amines can clearly be separated in the ion mobility dimension. The proposed method is applied to determining the concentration of biogenic amines in tuna storage, which showed that this method can quickly and accurately monitor the changes of biogenic amines in tuna during storage.

Automated summary

This research developed a method that combines HPLC and ESI-IMS to detect 7 kinds of biogenic amines in tuna. The method does not involve any derivatization steps, greatly reducing the sample preparation time and cost. It is able to quickly and accurately monitor the changes of biogenic amines in tuna during storage.