Analysis of Benzo(a)pyrene in Red Ginseng Beverage

Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons(PAHs) contamination arises from several source including processing of food(smoking, direct drying, cooking) and environmental contamination of air, water or soil. A red ginseng is produced by steaming the root followed by drying. The methodology involved extraction with n-hexane and washing with water, clean-up on Sep-Pak Florisil Cartridges and determination by HPLC/FLD. The mobile phase was a mixture of acetonitrile and water in 8:2 by the isocratic elution and the excitation wavelength of fluorescence detector was 294 nm and its emission wavelength was 404 nm. The average recovery was about 105% and the relative standard deviation was 0.5. The levels of benzopyrene in the selected red ginseng beverage samples were not detected.