ABSTRACT
Objective: To establish a fast quantitative detection method for tartrazine, sunset yellow, orange Ⅱ sodium salt and allura red in safflower by solid phase extraction-electrospray ionization-high performance ion mobility spectrometry (SPE-ESI-HPIMS).Methods: The pigments were extracted by 70% ethanol with ultrasonic treatment, and then a polyamide SPE column was used to remove the complex matrix interference in safflower.The purified sample was then dissolved in 90% methanol and analyzed under the optimized IMS parameters.Results: The detection time of all the pigments was less than 20 ms.The limit of detection of tartrazine, sunset yellow, orange Ⅱ sodium salt and allura red was 0.17 , 0.15 , 0.30 and 0.25 μg·ml-1 , respectively.All the pigments showed excellent linearity within the range of 0.5-20 μg·ml-1 (r＞0.990 0), the method recovery was 88.0%-98.9% , and the RSD was 1.5%-5.2% (n =6).Conclusion: The method is rapid, simple, highly sensitive and reproducible, and suitable for the rapid quantitative detection of illegal added staining substances in safflower.