Qualitative and quantitative treatment of thin-layer chromatograms of incompletely separated synthetic food colors

摘要

A procedure for qualitative and quantitative determination of dyes after thin-layer chromatographic separation is developed using an example of five synthetic food colors: brilliant blue, tartrazine, sunset yellow, ponceau 4R, and azorubine. The chromatogram is scanned and saved in Windows 95/98 raster image format and processed by Adobe Photoshop 5.0 program package. The procedure is applicable even when the dyes are incompletely separated on the chromatogram.