Electrocatalytic Application of Girard's Reagent T to Simultaneous Determination of Furaldehydes in Pharmaceutical and Food Matrices by Highly Sensitive Voltammetric Methods

Sensitive and precise voltammetric methods for the determination of trace amounts of furaldehydes, mainly as furfural (F) and 5-hydroxymethyl-2-furaldehyde (HMF), in foods, pharmaceutical and other matrices is described. Determination of total furaldehyde at < mu g g(-1) levels in alkaline buffered aqueous media was individually investigated. By the use of ordinary SWV and adsorptive square wave stripping voltammetry (Ad-SWSV), the detection limits for determination of F and HMF found to be 400 and 10 mu g g(-1), respectively. At a 1.0 mu g g(-1) level of furfural in sample, the relative standard deviation (n = 4) was 2.79%. The application of Ad-SWSV to the determination of F and HMF, after their in situ derivatization with trimethylaminoacetohydrazide chloride (Girard's reagent T) at a static mercury drop electrode (SMDE) in NH3-NH4Cl buffer of pH 9.5, resulted in a limit of detection of 10 ng g(-1) for the resolved peaks of HMF and F. The results obtained by the proposed method for the real samples were compared with the corresponding results from UV-spectrophotometry and HPLC experiments in various matrices.