Application of capillary isotachophoretic method to the determination of nitrate and nitrite ions in meat products

The application of capillary isotachophoretic method to the simultaneous determination of nitrates and nitrites in meat products was studied. Simple electrolyte system allowed separation of ions in standard solution with within-day and between-days coefficient of variation (CV) of relative step hight in the ranges 2.3–2.5% and 4.1–5.5%, respectively. The levels of nitrates and nitrites ranged from 3 to 65 mg/kg NaNO3 and from 36 to 111 mg/kg NaNO2. The coefficients of variation for nitrites were 0.7–3.5% and for nitrates 2.3–5.9%, that indicated satisfactory precision of the proposed method. The recoveries for meat samples spiked with nitrites and nitrates varied between 95–99% and 91–102%, respectively.