Caffeine is a Stimulant Produced by Tea Leaves or Coffee Berries (Lab Report Sample)

Caffeine is a Stimulant Produced by Tea Leaves or Coffee Berries

I. ABSTRACT
Background: Caffeine is a stimulant produced by tea leaves or coffee berries, and may be found in certain beverages or food suppliments. There are few standardized methods of caffeine content determination and sometimes manufacturers of beverages take advantage of that and quote misleading or lowly exaggerated percentages of caffeine content in peoduct labels to pass FDA regulations.
Objective: The purpose of this Lab is to analyse the actuall amounts of caffeine in energy drinks marketed to adolescents and young adults below the age of 25 years, by use of HPLC technique.
Design: High-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) stationary phase of C18 ODS hypersil, 250mm by 4,6mm - 5 micron, and a mobile phase that consist of 60% aqueous methanon were used together with a UV detector and uL sample loop to analyse standards of known caffeine concentrations and beverage samples. An external standard curve for caffeine analysis was constructed.
Results: Analysis with HPLC was able to determine that Redbull and Tenzil contains the highest caffeine content ( 122.6 and 102.5 mg/100mL respectively), followed by Monster at 96mg/100mL. The other two Sunsol and Mountain dew contained relatively lower caffeine content (56.5 and 47.6 mg/100mL respectively) but which is much higher than the recommended. The content of caffeine which HPLC could analyse was compared with the nutrition data labels: it was found that the caffeine content stated on the labels and therefore being marketed is too much lower than the actual.
Conclusion: Despite the fact that HPLC technique is easier to use and and gives more precise results, it is not the most accurate method of analysis of caffeine content in beverages. Caffein content that adolescents and young adults below 25 are exposed to is far march higer and posses healthy implications to these population.
II. INTRODUCTION
Caffeine (1,3,7-trimethyxanthin) is plant excretory product obtained from both leaves and berries of tea and coffee respectively (Beauchamp, Amaducci & Cook 2017). It activates the CNS by blocking adenosine receptors thus avoiding the development of adenosine-induced drowsiness and relieving the body of fatigue which makes one more alert (Wei & De Mejia 2010). It is the most widely used psychoactive drug in the world. Unlike many other psychoactive drugs, it is legal and unrestricted in virtually every part of the world.. Caffeine also activates some aspects of the autonomic nervous system. The recommended dairy dose of caffeine is 400mg and should not exceed a concentration of 200ppm in a single beverage drink. That is according to both the Food and Drugs Admistration (FDA) and the Dietary Recomendation for Americans (You, 2015). Excess caffeine intake has been found to affect health such as over stimulation of the CNS and may result in lack of sleep, increased anxiety, headache (Heckman, Wei & De Mejia 2010). Dosages above 150mg/100mL have been associated with caffeine toxicity and may cause death.
Coffee , tea and energy drinks are the primary sources of caffeine for most Americans because they are readily available. Although energy drinks contain large amounts of caffeine than any source, they are consumed at relatively higher amounts by the age bracket described in this study. Other workers such as those working at night and long distance truck drivers have also been shown to be heavy consumers of these products (You, 2015). Caffeine is a legal drug and therefore very little regulative measures have been put in place to monitor its intake, and labelling (Basics 2011). Besides many companies who manufacture bevarages disregard recommendations by FDA on the maximum caffeine content in bevarages, and coupled with lack of a standardized method of analysis in the industry, caffeine content if foods is enormous. The only methods available for use are HPLC, Gas chromatography (GC), electrophoresis, and UV-Visible electroscopy (Beauchamp, Amaducci & Cook 2017).
In this Lab, the caffeine content of Tenzing, red bull, Monster, Sunsol, and Mountain dew were analysed and the results compared against what the Nutrition Fact Labels indicate for each respective beverage. The specific energy drinks were chosen because they are the most common marketed to the age bracket under study. HPLC was the chosen method of analysis because it is simple to use and is more precise, as well as the most common in the food industry. Tenzil, red bull and Monster were expected to contain higher concentrations of caffeine as per the labels, while Sunsol and Mountain dew were regarded as having lower caffeine content respectively. Besides the study hypothesized that there is no significant difference between the caffeine content of the labels and the actual caffeine content determined experimentally. III. MATERIALS AND METHODSHigh-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) technique was utilized in this experiment to determine caffeine content in the selected samples from the five common energy drinks.