Reliability of the ΔECN42 limit and global method for extra virgin olive oil purity assessment using different analytical approaches

Marco Beccaria; Erica Moret; Giorgia Purcaro; Lorena Pizzale; Antonella Cotroneo; Paola Dugo; Luigi Mondello; Lanfranco S Conte

doi:10.1016/j.foodchem.2015.05.075

Reliability of the ΔECN42 limit and global method for extra virgin olive oil purity assessment using different analytical approaches

Food Chem. 2016 Jan 1:190:216-225. doi: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2015.05.075. Epub 2015 May 18.

Authors

Marco Beccaria¹, Erica Moret², Giorgia Purcaro³, Lorena Pizzale², Antonella Cotroneo¹, Paola Dugo⁴, Luigi Mondello⁴, Lanfranco S Conte²

Affiliations

¹ Dipartimento di Scienze del Farmaco e dei Prodotti per la Salute (SCIFAR), University of Messina, Viale Annunziata, 98168 Messina, Italy.
² Dipartimento di Scienze degli Alimenti, University of Udine, Via Sondrio 2/A, 33100 Udine, Italy.
³ Dipartimento di Scienze degli Alimenti, University of Udine, Via Sondrio 2/A, 33100 Udine, Italy. Electronic address: giorgia.purcaro@uniud.it.
⁴ Dipartimento di Scienze del Farmaco e dei Prodotti per la Salute (SCIFAR), University of Messina, Viale Annunziata, 98168 Messina, Italy; Centro Integrato di Ricerca (C.I.R.), Università Campus Bio-medico, via Alvaro del Portillo 21, 00128 Roma, Italy.

PMID: 26212964
DOI: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2015.05.075

Abstract

Two data elaboration approaches for evaluating olive oils authenticity were compared: (I) determination of the difference between the theoretical and actual amounts of triacylglycerols with partition number 42 (ΔECN42 ⩽ |0.2|); and (II) the global method, which considers also partition numbers 44 and 46 (returning a "correct"/"not correct" result). Analysis of 31 genuine extra virgin olive oil samples was performed using different analytical methods, namely liquid chromatography (LC) coupled with a refractive index detector (RID) and LC coupled with a mass spectrometry (MS), and the results compared. Several false positives were highlighted using the ΔECN42 limit with both instrumental approaches. The global method algorithm returned "correct" results for all the samples analysed (except two that gave no results) with LC-MS; on the other hand, 10 false positives were obtained elaborating data deriving from NARP-LC-RID analysis.

Keywords: Authenticity; Delta-ECN42; Global method; High performance liquid chromatography (HPLC); Mass spectrometry (MS); Olive oil; Refractive index detector (RID); Triacyglycerol (TAG).

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid / methods*
Mass Spectrometry / methods*
Olive Oil / chemistry*
Plant Oils / chemistry*

Substances

Olive Oil
Plant Oils