Development of an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay for the determination of 5-hydroxymethyl-2-furfural in food.

5-Hydroxymethyl-2-furfural (5-HMF) is considered to be an excellent indicator of quality deterioration due to excessive heating or storage for a wide range of carbohydrate-containing foods. To facilitate its analysis, a highly selective and sensitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay for determination of 5-HMF in food has been developed. A specific polyclonal antibody was produced against a conjugate of 5-HMF coupled to bovine serum albumin. The IC(50) and limit of method detection were 0.15 ± 0.012 mg L(-1) and 0.02 ± 0.002 mg L(-1), respectively. The proposed method was applied to detect 5-HMF in French mini bread, potato chips, French soft bread, and wheat chicken nuggets with recoveries ranging from 84.07 to 97.09% and relative standard deviation (n = 3) below 8.65% in all samples. The quantitative results were in good agreement with those obtained by the high-performance liquid chromatography method, which suggests that the method developed will be very useful for monitoring 5-HMF in food samples.