Vitamin E Content of Infant Formulas and Cereals

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Abstract
A method employing extraction into ethanol, saponification in the presence of ascorbic acid, reextraction into Skelly-solve-B, chromatography through columns of Florisil, 2-dimensional paper chromatography, and colorimetric reading with ferric chloride-dipyridyl was used for analyzing infant formulas and cereals for the tocopherols. Some variability in degree of recovery by the various procedures was observed among the different tocopherols. Certain of the procedures were studied and discussed. The 6 infant formulas and 10 infant cereals analyzed were found to contain 0.08–3.86 and 0.03–1.80 mg/l00 g total tocopherol, respectively, and 0.08–1.06 and 0.03–0.49 mg/100 g alpha-tocopherol, respectively. The low levels of total and alpha-tocopherols in the infant cereals of one brand indicated much destruction of tocopherol during certain processing of cereals for infant consumption. These infant formulas and cereals had such low levels of alpha-tocopherol that they might be unsatisfactory sources of tocopherol for infant consumption. Supplementation of all infant formulas with alpha-tocopherol is indicated.