Food Additives (Hypochlorous Acid Water, Sodium Metabisulfite, and Sodium Sulfite) Strongly Affect the Chemical and Biological Properties of Vitamin B12 in Aqueous Solution

Naho Okamoto; Tomohiro Bito; Nanami Hiura; Ayaka Yamamoto; Mayu Iida; Yasuhiro Baba; Tomoyuki Fujita; Atsushi Ishihara; Yukinori Yabuta; Fumio Watanabe

doi:10.1021/acsomega.0c00425

Food Additives (Hypochlorous Acid Water, Sodium Metabisulfite, and Sodium Sulfite) Strongly Affect the Chemical and Biological Properties of Vitamin B₁₂ in Aqueous Solution

ACS Omega. 2020 Mar 10;5(11):6207-6214. doi: 10.1021/acsomega.0c00425. eCollection 2020 Mar 24.

Authors

Naho Okamoto¹, Tomohiro Bito^{1

2}, Nanami Hiura², Ayaka Yamamoto², Mayu Iida², Yasuhiro Baba², Tomoyuki Fujita³, Atsushi Ishihara^{1

2}, Yukinori Yabuta^{1

2}, Fumio Watanabe^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ The United Graduate School of Agricultural Sciences, Tottori University, 4-101 Koyama-Minami, Tottori City, Tottori 680-8553, Japan.
² Faculty of Agriculture, School of Agricultural, Biological, and Environmental Sciences, Tottori University, Tottori 680-8553, Japan.
³ Faculty of Agriculture, Department of Agricultural and Life Sciences, Shinshu University, Nagano 399-4598, Japan.

Abstract

Food additives, such as hypochlorous acid water, sodium metabisulfite, and sodium sulfite, strongly affect the chemical and biological properties of vitamin B₁₂ (cyanocobalamin) in aqueous solution. When cyanocobalamin (10 μmol/L) was treated with these compounds, hypochlorous acid water (an effective chlorine concentration of 30 ppm) rapidly reacted with cyanocobalamin. The maximum absorptions at 361 and 550 nm completely disappeared by 1 h, and vitamin B₁₂ activity was lost. There were no significant changes observed in the absorption spectra of cyanocobalamin for 0.01% (w/v) sodium metabisulfite; however, a small amount of the reaction product was formed within 48 h, which was subsequently identified as sulfitocobalamin through high-performance liquid chromatography. Similar results were shown for sodium sulfite. The effects of these food additives on the vitamin B₁₂ content of red shrimp and beef meats were determined, revealing no significant difference in vitamin B₁₂ content of shrimp and beef meats with or without the treatment even in hypochlorous acid water. The results suggest that these food additives could not react with food vitamin B₁₂ in food, as most of this vitamin present in food is its protein-bound form rather than the free form.