Authors: Nadine S Feichtmeier Nadine Ruchter Sonja Zimmermann Bernd Sures Kerstin Leopold
Publish Date: 2015/10/19
Volume: 408, Issue: 1, Pages: 295-305
Abstract
Engineered silver nanoparticles AgNPs are implemented in food contact materials due to their powerful antimicrobial properties and so may enter the human food chain Hence it is desirable to develop easy sensitive and fast analytical screening methods for the determination of AgNPs in complex biological matrices This study describes such a method using solid sampling highresolution continuum source graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometry GFAAS A recently reported novel evaluation strategy uses the atomization delay of the respective GFAAS signal as significant indicator for AgNPs and thereby allows discrimination of AgNPs from ionic silver Ag+ in the samples without elaborate sample pretreatment This approach was further developed and applied to a variety of biological samples Its suitability was approved by investigation of eight different food samples parsley apple pepper cheese onion pasta maize meal and wheat flour spiked with ionic silver or AgNPs Furthermore the migration of AgNPs from silverimpregnated polypropylene food storage boxes to fresh pepper was observed and a mussel sample obtained from a laboratory exposure study with silver was investigated The differences in the atomization delays Δt ad between silver ions and 20nm AgNPs vary in a range from −201 ± 138 s for maize meal to +206 ± 108 s for mussel tissue However the differences were significant in all investigated matrices and so indicative of the presence/absence of AgNPs Moreover investigation of model matrices cellulose gelatine and water gives the first indication of matrixdependent trends Reproducibility and homogeneity tests confirm the applicability of the method
Keywords: