Monitoring of melamine contamination in fat watery milk by the photoluminescence analysis

A photoluminescence method to detect the toxic melamine contamination in fat watery milk has been proposed. Despite the quite different luminescence origins of milk and melamine patterns, their wide emission spectra under UV excitation are similar and in the range of 2.2–3.5 eV. The complex milk photoluminescence spectrum composed of riboflavin, furosine, lactulose, Vitamin E and tryptophan emitting species can be modified if milk pattern is undergone by acid treatment (for example, in vinegar). At the same time the melamine emission is not subjected to any modification in vinegar. It allows quantitatively discriminating the melamine contamination in milk in linear range, at least, 0.05–7 g/l from different photoluminescence spectra of milk (water) with and without melamine. Limit of melamine detection achieves 0.01 g/l.