Determination of 14 whitening active components in cosmetics by ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-triple quadrupole mass spectrometry

A method based on ultra high performance liquid chromatography-triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS/ MS) was developed for the analysis of 14 whitening active components in oilycosmetics. The 14 whitening active components were extracted from cosmetics by supersonic extraction with 20 mmol / L potassium dihydrogen phosphate solution, purified by HLB solid phase extraction column and filtered with 0. 22 μm filter membrane. Shim-pack GIST C18 AQ chromatographic column was used for the separation of the whitening active components. Methanol-0. 1% formic acid solution(containing 5 mmol / L ammonium acetate)was employed as mobile phase for gradient elution, and the analytes were detected by electrospray ionization source with positive and negative ion alternate scanning mode and multiple reaction monitoring mode (MRM). The results showed that an effective separation was achieved within 10 min under the optimized conditions, 14 whitening active components exhibited good linear relationships in the respective linear range with the correlation coefficient more than 0. 999. The limits of detection were in the range of 0. 15-2. 5 mg / kg, and the limits of quantitation were in the range of 0. 5-7. 5 mg / kg. The recoveries were from 70% to 117%, and the relative standard deviations were between 0. 2% and 12% . © 2022, Youke Publishing Co.,Ltd. All rights reserved.