Alternative reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography method to analyse organic acids in dairy products

A RP-HPLC method for the analysis of oxalic, citric, formic, succinic, orotic, uric, pyruvic, acetic, propionic, lactic and butyric acids in dairy products with a simple treatment of the sample has been developed. A gradient programme pumping phosphate buffer at pH 2.20 and acetonitrile was used to separate the compounds on a C18 column. Various parameters affecting analysis have been optimised to take <18 min with an excellent linearity (R>0.999). The precision was good (R.S.D.<5%) and the recovery found close to 100%. Its application to analyse the quality of some dairy products has been investigated.