Determination of Sulfite in Food by Flow Injection Analysis

A method is described for the determination of sulfite levels in food products by flow injection analysis (FIA). The method is based on the decolorization of malachite green by S02, which is isolated from the flowing sample stream by means of a gas diffusion cell. The FIA method has a detection limit in food sample extracts of 0.1 ppm S02 (3 times peak height of blank), which corresponds to 1-10 ppm S02 in a food product, depending on the extraction procedure used. At the 5 ppm SO2 level in a food extract, the precision of replicate injections is ± 1-2%. The method was tested on a variety of both sulfite-treaied and untreated food products and the results compared favorably with those obtained by the Monier-Williams, colorimetric (pararosaniline), and enzymatic (sulfite oxidase) methods. The average differences from the FIA results were 19, 11, and 12%, respectively, for those samples (n = 12) above SO ppm S02. At lower levels the results were somewhat more erratic due to inaccuracies of the various methods at low concentrations.