Rapid screening of mineral oil aromatic hydrocarbons (MOAH) in grains by fluorescence spectroscopy

Abstract On-line high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with gas chromatography with flame ionization detector (LC-GC) has become an important technique for the determination of mineral oil aromatic hydrocarbons (MOAH) in foods. However, the analysis is complicated and time-consuming. The present study aimed to develop a fluorescence spectrophotometry approach for the fast screening of MOAH in grains. A reference material, which is a mixture of diesel oils and lubricants, was selected for MOAH calibration. The excitation/emission wavelength of EX230 nm/EM330 nm was determined and the linear range was 0.125–2.5 mg/kg with an R 2 of 0.999. The MOAH content determined by the fluorescence method showed good correlation with that determined by LC-GC ( r  = 0.946). This result suggested that the performance of these two methods was comparable, and thus fluorescence spectroscopy can be used for screening MOAH. A MOAH content of >0.1 mg/kg in grains could be rapidly determined by fluorescence spectroscopy.