Detection and identification of sugar alcohol sweeteners by ion mobility spectrometry

Abstract

The rapid and sensitive detection of sugar alcohol sweeteners was demonstrated using ion mobility spectrometry (IMS). IMS provides a valuable alternative in sensitivity, cost, and analysis speed between the lengthy gold-standard liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) technique and rapid point-of-measurement disposable colorimetric sensors, for the Food and Nutrition industry’s quality control and other “foodomics” area needs. The IMS response, characteristic signatures, and limits of detection for erythritol, pentaerythritol, xylitol, inositol, sorbitol, mannitol, and maltitol were evaluated using precise inkjet printed samples. IMS system parameters including desorption temperature, scan time, and swipe substrate material were examined and optimized, demonstrating a strong dependence on the physicochemical properties of the respective sugar alcohol. The desorption characteristics of each compound were found to dominate the system response and overall sensitivity. Sugar alcohol components of commercial products – chewing gum and a sweetener packet – were detected and identified using IMS. IMS is demonstrated to be an advantageous field deployable instrument, easily operated by non-technical personnel, and enabling sensitive point-of-measurement quality assurance for sugar alcohols.

Inkjet Printing and 3D Printing Strategies for Biosensing, Analytical, and Diagnostic Applications

“…This feature makes inkjet printing a suitable tool to reliably calibrate analytical instruments and to validate the quantitative detection ability of devices. For this purpose, for example, Browne et al utilized inkjet printing for the deposition of defined amounts of artificial sweeteners to calibrate an ion mobility spectrometer [36] for the easy and rapid quantification of the sweetener content in food. Several other examples providing calibration curves for, for example, mass spectrometry (MS), have been reported in the literature for different analytes and applications.…”

Ion Mobility Spectrometry in Food Analysis: Principles, Current Applications and Future Trends

“…Due to the complexity of food matrices, stand-alone IMS has rarely been investigated in food composition studies, although it has found a wider application in food process analysis where few and specific compounds are determined, as will be shown in Section 3.2. As an example, stand-alone IMS has been used for the analysis of seven alcohol sweeteners in chewing gum, identifying the presence of sorbitol [51]. Other peaks were also observed in the ion mobility spectrum which were attributed to gum base components.…”

Non-Targeted Screening Approaches for Profiling of Volatile Organic Compounds Based on Gas Chromatography-Ion Mobility Spectroscopy (GC-IMS) and Machine Learning

“…The most common ionization method is the atmospheric pressure chemical ionization [ 16 ] by beta emitters, which frequently use nickel-63 (Ni-63) [ 11 , 15 , 17 , 18 ] or the less hazardous beta-emitting tritium (H-3) [ 19 ] or alpha-emitting americium-241 (Am-241) [ 20 , 21 ]. Other ionization methods are atmospheric pressure photo ionization (APPI) [ 22 ], which uses ultraviolet light (UV) [ 23 , 24 ] or corona discharge (CD) atmospheric pressure chemical ionization [ 17 , 25 , 26 , 27 ], where a high electric field between a needle and a metal plate or discharge electrode is used. Yet another method is the laser desorption/ionization technique (LDI), which employs a laser pulse as ion source [ 28 ].…”

“…IMS alone has been applied for quantification [ 11 , 15 , 17 , 27 ] and classification [ 5 ] tasks in controlled environments. However, due to the inherent diversity of biogenic samples, the applications of IMS with direct sample introduction are often not sufficient, requiring prior purification or separation.…”