Abstract:

According to the chemical properties of anthocyanins in wine and the characteristics of commonly used red pigments,
a simple, rapid and inexpensive lead acetate test strip assay was developed for the detection of added red pigments in red wine.
Meanwhile, an analytical method to determine added synthetic red pigments, allura red, carmine and amaranth, in fake wine
was proposed using capillary electrophoresis. The effects of running buffer type, concentration and pH value and separation
voltage on the separation of the synthetic red pigments were investigated to establish the optimum experimental conditions. The
best separation among allura red, carmine and amaranth was achieved within 6 min under the following conditions: 10 mmol/L
NaH2PO4 (pH 11) as running buffer, separation voltage 15 kV, and detection wavelength 215 nm.

Key words: red wine, lead acetate test strip, artificial pigment, capillary electrophoresis