Simultaneous determination of methylxanthines in coffees and teas by UV-Vis spectrophotometry and partial least squares

This work describes a method to simultaneously determine caffeine (CF) and theobromine (TB) in coffee and tea samples using partial least squares (PLS-1). Sample preparation was required to eliminate strong interfering components. High-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC)-found concentrations of caffeine and theobromine (theophylline was not found in any analyzed sample) were used to construct universal calibration matrixes for coffee and tea. Due to the low levels of theobromine when compared to caffeine (up to 1000:1), theobromine addition standard was required to dramatically improve method performance. The method developed did not show statistically significant differences with an HPLC standard technique.