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Kaltner, Florian; Gottschalk, Christoph; Vries, Elena de und Mulder, Patrick P.J. (2025): Transfer of pyrrolizidine and tropane alkaloids from tea and herbal tea to infusions. In: Food Chemistry, Bd. 489, 145026 [PDF, 2MB]

Abstract

Pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs) and tropane alkaloids (TAs) are phytotoxins that occur worldwide and are important contaminants of food, especially (herbal) teas. Their transfer rates to tea infusions strongly influence exposure estimates, but conflicting results have been obtained so far, making risk assessment uncertain. Therefore, infusions prepared under controlled conditions from artificially contaminated black and herbal tea and naturally PA-containing comfrey root (Symphytum officinale) were analyzed by UPLC-MS/MS. Brewing time, repeated infusion, pH and temperature of the infusion were evaluated. Infusions of black tea and herbal tea produced under standardized conditions resulted in PA/TA transfer rates between 30 % and 68 %, with an average of 49 %. Surprisingly, brewing time was not found to be a significant factor. Instead, the polarity of the compounds and the pH of the tea infusion due to the tea matrix were identified as main factors. Consequently, teas should be analyzed as infusion for realistic exposure estimates.

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