Developments and strategies in the spectrochemical elemental analysis of fruit juices

• This review deals with different aspects of the elemental analysis of fruit juices.
• We describe the sources and the roles of the elements in fruit juices.
• We survey analytical spectrometric methods for the elemental analysis of fruit juices.
• Sample treatment of fruit juices prior to determination and speciation of elements.

Information on the concentration of major, minor and trace elements in fruit juices is very important because the popularity of these beverages and the rate of their consumption have rapidly increased in the past 20 years. For the overwhelming majority of cases, the elemental analysis of fruit juices is carried out using spectrochemical analytical methods, which normally require samples of fruit juices to be prepared by decomposing their organic matrix and releasing elements in a form suitable for measurement. This review covers different aspects of the elemental analysis of fruit juices and the societal implications related to the presence of various elements in these beverages. We review in detail sample-preparation procedures executed before the elemental analysis together with calibration strategies used, and quality assurance and quality control of results.