Analysis of saccharides iby flow-injection with electrospray mass spectrometry

Saccharides in foods play important roles as they are essential substrates for fermentation processes. In brewing, the concentration of maltooligosaccharides influences the characteristics of beers and therefore their determination is of great practical interest. Electrospray mass spectrometry (ESI-MS) was applied to identify and characterise maltooligosaccharides in beer samples. The effects due to different cation concentrations and dilution of samples were studied. Furthermore, quantitative analyses of maltooligosaccharides by means of flow injection- ESI-MS (FI/ESI-MS) of 1mL beer samples (diluted 1000-fold) are described.