DETERMINATION OF BIOGENIC-AMINES IN WINE AFTER CLEANUP BY SOLID-PHASEEXTRACTION

A suitable method for the determination of 16 biogenic amines in wine has been developed. The method involves clean-up of wine samples using ion-exchange cartridges and a preconcentration step, under controlled vacuum, before derivatization of the amines by treatment with phthala ldehyde (PA) and reversed-phase HPLC with gradient elution and fluorim etric detection. Linearity of response was obtained for all the biogen ic amines from 100 mu g L(-1) to 10 mg L(-1) Limits of detection for t he amines were similar for all PA-derivatives (25-50 mu g L(-1)) and t he quantitation limits were about 0.1 mg L(-1) clean-up and preconcent ration, the concentration levels increased 10-fold for all amines exce pt putrescine and cadaverine, which gave poor recovery by this method unlike the rest which gave recoveries of almost 90%. The overall proce ss was successfully applied to identify and quantify biogenic amines i n several red wines from the Tarragona region.