2.0 DETERMINATION OF NITROSAMINE IN FOODS
Determination of food toxicants involves two essential processes, which are the detection of the presence of toxicants in food and then qualitate and quantitate them to determine the type and level of toxicants existing in the food. Since any substances with significant level of toxicant will not be called as food, thus food toxicants normally present in very low levels. Due to their low level condition, chemical analysis of the toxicants involves separating them from the rest of the chemicals in the food and then determining the amount. Each of the separated components of food will be tested for toxicity and further separated until the pure toxicant can be completely isolated. At this point, chemical analysis will be conducted to elucidate the compound structure (Shibamoto and Bjeldanes, 2009).
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In general, nitrosamines can be categorized into either volatile nitrosamines or non-volatile nitrosamines. However, the levels of nitrosamines detected in different foods are vary greatly. For example, nitrates in cured meat products may vary in levels ranging from 10 to 200 ppm, while the detectable levels of nitrosamine in some other preserved meat products may range from below detectability, up to thousand µg/kg. It does not have a clear reason for the variability encountered but it is suggested to be depending on the type of nitrosamine, food, and the conditions of conducting the examination (Shibamoto and Bjeldanes, 2009; Herrmann et al.,