Simple Spectrophotometric Method for Determination of Sodium Benzoate in some Beverages

Many previous studies have shown that excessive consumption of food products containing sodium benzoate may cause many side effects that can be harmful to health. Thus, it is critical to evaluate the amount of benzoic acid and its salts in food products by inexpensive and uncomplicated method for repeated examination. So, in this study, we determined the optimal conditions for extracting benzoates from food products available in local markets in order to determine their proportions and ensure that they are within the permissible limits. Various conditions were studied (solvent, acid, acid concentration and volume, temperature and volume of the solvent used). The best results were obtained by using hexane as a solvent in a volume of 30ml in presence of phosphoric acid at a concentration of (0.70M) at laboratory temperature. The analytical method has been validated and R² was (0.9995), The standard deviation ranged between (0.94-1.85)% over one day, and ranged between (0.55-1.10)% over three consecutive days. The percentage of benzoates was also measured in a commercial some sample beverages; it was found that the amount of benzoate present in it was within the acceptable limits according to the standard specification.