DETERMINATION OF XYLITOL, D-SORBITOL AND D-MANNITOL IN FOOD BY ANION-EXCHANGE CHROMATOGRAPHY WITH PULSED AMPEROMETRIC DETECTION

An anion-exchange chromatography (IC) with pulsed amperometric detecti on of xylitol, D-sorbitol and n-mannitol in food was developed. These alcoholic sugars extracted with 80% ethanol from food were diluted 100 0 times with water as IC samples. The detection limit of each standard sugar alcohol was 0.025 ppm (25 ppm in food). The sensitivity of this method was about 1000 and 30 times higher than those of high performa nce liquid chromatography (HPLC) with refractive index (RI) detection and gas chromatography (GC) with flame-ionization (FID) detection, res pectively. Furthermore the sample treatment is simple compared with ot her methods. The recoveries of xylitol, D-sorbitoI and D-mannitol adde d in foods were 77.8-104.0%.