Ultra-performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry for the analysis of heterocyclic amines in food

A new ultra-performance™ liquid chromatography–electrospray tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC–ESI–MS/MS) method was developed to perform the determination of 16 mutagenic heterocyclic amines (HAs) in complex food samples in less than 2 min. The UPLC separation was carried out using an Acquity BEH C18 column (50 mm × 2.1 mm i.d., 1.7 μm particle size) that provided high efficiency and resolution in combination with high linear velocities. The UPLC system was coupled to the triple quadrupole Waters Micromass Quattro Premier™. This system permits high-speed data acquisition without peak intensity degradation which is required to monitor the narrow chromatographic peaks (1–2 s) of HAs. The determination was performed in selected reaction monitoring (SRM) mode. The quality parameters of the developed method were established, obtaining instrumental LODs lower than 0.23 pg injected and a repeatability at low concentration level lower than 9.1% CV (n = 6). To evaluate the performance of the method in high throughput analysis of complex samples, the UPLC–MS/MS method was applied to the analysis of HAs in two meat extracts.