Abstract:The migration of mineral oil saturated hydrocarbons (MOSH) from food packaging paper into the food simulant Tenax was studied and the migration behavior of MOSH was explored for different types of food packaging paper and at different temperatures (25 ℃, 40 ℃, and 100 ℃). The threshold of toxicological concerns (TTC) was introduced to assess the safety of MOSH. The results showed that the thickness and grammage of the food packaging paper was important for the migration of MOSH at a specific temperature, and a smaller thickness and lower grammage led to a greater MOSH migration rate. Under certain conditions, a higher temperature resulted in a shorter time to reach the migration equilibrium for MOSH (100 ℃: 100 min; 25 ℃: 8 days) and a greater migration rate (100 ℃, 24.81% and 25 ℃, 7.82%). The amount of migrated MOSH of all testing packaging paper samples at equilibrium were beyond the migration limit (0.6 mg/kg) specified by the Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives. Most MOSH is prone to migration had chains of C16~C18 or C23~C26, and they belonged to the low- and medium-viscosity mineral oils that are easily accumulated in the human body. The TTC results showed that migrating MOSH were classified as Cramer Class I. The estimated daily intakes of MOSH from four types of food packaging paper into Tenax were markedly higher than the corresponding TTC threshold (1.8 mg/person?day), which requires further analysis.
