Simultaneous determination of tetracycline and clenbuterol residues in aquatic products by high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry

An analytical method for the determination of tetracycline and clenbuterol residues in aquatic products by high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry(HPLC-MS / MS) was established.The sample was extracted with ammonium acetate buffer,defatted-up by hexane,and cleaned up using mixed-mode cation exchange solid-phase extraction cartridges(PCX).The mass spectrometer was operated in the positive ion mode using selected reaction monitoring for the qualitative and quantitative analysis.The detection limits of this method for tetracyclines and clenbuterol residues were 0.25 μg / kg,and the limits of quantification were 0.5 μg / kg.The relative standard deviations ranged from 1.9% to 12%(n = 6) and the recoveries were from 64.3% to 100.6%.The method proposed by this paper possesses high reproducibility and selectivity.It is expected that it could be applied to the determination of the tetracycline and clenbuterol residues in aquatic products.