Simultaneous Analysis of Acrylamide and Its Key Precursors, Intermediates, and Products in Model Systems by Liquid Chromatography–Triple Quadrupole Mass Spectrometry

A new analytical setup allowing the simultaneous analysis of precursors, intermediates and products in Maillard reaction model systems was developed to investigate the formation and mitigation kinetics of acrylamide. It was based on high-performance liquid chromatography combined with electrospray ionization triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC–MS/MS). Chromatography and mass spectrometry conditions were optimized to permit simultaneous monitoring of compounds relevant to acrylamide, such as asparagine, glucose, glycine, N-(1-deoxy-d-fructos-1-yl)-glycine (DFG), N-(1-deoxy-d-fructos-1-yl)-asparagine (DFA), and four reaction products between acrylamide and glycine. A fairly good separation was achieved on a Venusil MP-C18 column using an isocratic eluent of 0.5% formic acid in water at a flow rate of 0.4 mL/min. Triple quadrupole mass spectrometry in multiple reaction monitoring mode (MRM) was applied to obtain good sensitivity. All of the ten key reaction compounds were separated and determined in a single run within 15 min. High correlation coefficients (r > 0.99) of the ten analytes were obtained in their respective linear ranges. The method was capable to accurately quantify the ten key compounds in model systems during heating. The results showed that acrylamide formed in Maillard reaction could be reduced by reacting directly with glycine, and acrylamide concentration constantly decreased by about 60% within the 180 min heating at 150 °C when glycine was equal to asparagine and glucose in molecular concentration in model systems. This method helps achieve reduction in both time and labor of analysis of a large number of samples.