Effect of temperature and type of food simulant on antioxidant stability

Additive migration levels in food simulants from polimeric materials that are intended to be into contact with food can be affected by additive stability under the migration test conditions. In this work, the stability of some phenolic antioxidants and one oxidized phosphite antioxidant was studied in four food simulants: distilled water, 3% (w/v) acetic acid, 10% (v/v) ethanol, and the fatty food simulant olive oil, under different temperatures 5, 40, and 70 degrees C, during similar to 20 days. Samples were analyzed by reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) with UV diode-array detector. In general, antioxidants appeared to be more stable in olive oil than in the aqueous simulants. Among aqueous simulants, water and 10% ethanol allowed the highest stability of antioxidants at low temperatures. The 3% acetic acid allowed good stability for the lowest phenolic compounds even at high temperatures, but the highest molecular weight compounds decomposed very fast even at low temperatures. (c) 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.