Development and Validation of a Green High Performance Liquid Chromatographic Method for the Determination of Some Artificial Sweeteners and Caffeine in Soft Drinks

A simple and green high performance liquid chromatographic method was developed to determine the acesulfame K, saccharin, aspartame, and caffeine content in soft drinks without the use of toxic organic solvents. Separation was carried out on a C18 column using ethanol–phosphate buffer as the mobile phase at 0.8 mL/min. Optimum separation was achieved in 15 min. Acesulfame K, saccharin, aspartame, and caffeine were detected at 225, 217, 217, and 280 nm, respectively. The calibration curves were linear (correlation coefficient ≥0.999) in the selected range of each analyte. The limit of detection was 0.024 mg/L for acesulfam K, 0.011 mg/L for saccharin, 0.024 mg/L for caffeine, and 0.014 mg/L for aspartame. The relative standard deviations in inter and intra-laboratory precision studies varied from 0.44% to 1.61%. Recoveries of the analytes from spiked diet cola samples were between 98.40% and 100.25%. The validated method was found to be accurate and precise in the working calibration range. The developed analysis method was applied to 56 soft drink samples and was statistically compared with a conventional method by using test material. In conclusion, the developed HPLC analysis method provided more accurate values than the conventional analysis method.