Electrochemical Detection of Polyphenolic Compounds in Foods and Beverages

Polyphenolic compounds, which are widely distributed in plant-derived foods, recently attracted much attention because of their possible health benefits arising from their antioxidant activity, such as free radical scavengers and inhibition of lipoprotein oxidation. The detection of phenolic substances in food samples has been performed for many methods among them electrochemical sensors and biosensors approaches. Polyphenolic compounds are good substrates for oxidases enzymes, then biosensors modified with tyrosinase, laccase and peroxidase have been developed for detection of phenolic compounds since phenols can act as electron donors for these enzymes. Furthermore, as polyphenols are electroanalytically active compounds that can be easily oxidized at inert electrodes, electrochemical sensors have also been used as tools for estimating the total phenolic content (TPC). This paper critically reviews both electrochemical sensors and biosensors developed for the evaluation of polyphenolic compounds in foods and beverages. Due to the ability of these devices to perform simple, fast and reliable analysis, they are promising tools for the assessment of antioxidant properties.