Abstract: A novel efficient and accurate ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS/MS) method for the detection of 13 diuretics in animal-derived foods was developed. The samples were extracted with acetonitrile or 90% acetonitrile solution and cleaned up on a PRiME HLB pass-through solid phase extraction (SPE) column. Then, an ACQUITY HSS T3 column (100 mm × 2.1 mm, 1.8 μm) was used for chromatographic separation by gradient elution using a mobile phase consisting of 5 mmol/L aqueous ammonium acetate and acetonitrile, and an electrospray ionization source (ESI) operated in both positive and negative ion scanning modes with multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) was used to detect the diuretics qualitatively and quantitatively. The results showed that the calibration curves for all the analytes exhibited good linearity with correlation coefficients above 0.997 0. The limits of quantification ranged from 2.0 to 5.0 μg/kg. The recoveries of the proposed method ranged between 68.3% and 118.0%, with relative standard deviations (RSDs) between 0.47% and 9.5% (n = 6). This method is a fast, simple, accurate, and practical one for the detection of diuretics.

Key words: ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry; diuretics; solid phase extraction cartridge; animal-derived foods