Migration of 4-nonylphenol from polyvinyl chloride food packaging films into food simulants and foods

Abstract

Migration of 4-nonylphenol (NP) from polyvinyl chloride (PVC) films for food packaging into food simulants and foods has been studied in domestic applications such as wrapping of food and reheating in a microwave oven. The migration of NP from the PVC films was determined by high-performance liquid chromatography with electrochemical coulometric-array detection (LC/ED). Twelve PVC films intended for commercial use and ten for domestic applications (total: 22 samples) were analysed. Some of the PVC films (two home-use and ten retail-use) contained NP at concentrations of between 500 and 3300 µg/g. Migration of NP from the films was influenced by the test conditions (n-heptane at 25°C for 60min, distilled water at 60°C for 30min and 4% acetic acid at 60°C for 30min). The amount of NP migrating from the PVC films into n-heptane (0.33-1.6 µg/cm²) was higher than the amount migrating into distilled water or 4% acetic acid (up to 9.7ng/cm²) for the 11 films in which NP was detected. Up to 0.23% of the NP migrated into distilled water and 4% acetic acid and up to 62.5% into n-heptane. In addition, we investigated NP migration into cooked rice samples wrapped in PVC film. Using spiked samples the method gave an average recovery of 83.7% (n = 5) with a standard deviation of 2.5%. Migration of NP ranged from not detectable (<1.0ng/g) to 410.0ng/g by reheating samples in a microwave oven for 1min and from not detectable to 76.5ng/g by keeping samples at room temperature for 30min.