High performance liquid chromatographic determination of organic acids in honeys from different botanical origin

A high performance liquid chromatographic method for the determination of o rganic acids in honeys, is reported. The components were removed from the m atrix by solid-phase extraction with anion exchange cartridges and subseque ntly separated using two chromatographic systems. The chromatographic separ ation of the acids was achieved by means of an Organic Acids column, using sulfuric acid as mobile phase. To confirm the identification of the acids t wo Spherisorb ODS-1 S5 columns connected in series were also used, the mobi le phase was ammonium dihydrogen phosphate pH=2.2. The compounds were detec ted with a UV-Vis detector (210nm). The proposed procedure has been applied to determine several organic acids (pyruvic, citric, galacturonic, gluconic, citramalic, glycolic, formic, ace tic, butyric, tartaric, malonic, malic, quinic, fumaric, succinic, lactic a nd propionic) in honey samples from different botanical origin.