Development and validation of a multi-residue method for pesticide determination in tomatoes by GC-MS/MS

Pesticide residues are analyzed for various application areas such as food safety, environmental pollution, toxicology and occupational health. With the development of modern agriculture, residue analyses of pesticides, which are used extensively in the production of fruits and vegetables, have become a very important issue. Detailed and sensitive analysis and monitoring of pesticide residues are necessary for people to assess their level of exposure to pesticides by food consumption. It is very important to use accurate and reliable methods to determine pesticide residues to ensure food safety. For this reason, it is important to develop appropriate, efficient, fast and accurate methods for quantitative and qualitative analysis. In this thesis study, it is aimed to determine as many pesticide agents as possible by a single analytical study using Gas Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometer (GC-MS/MS). Thus, it will be possible to reduce the analysis costs, shorten the analysis period and contribute to the studies to determine the pesticide residues. This research is intended to analyze all the pesticides that can be detected by gas chromatography, which theirs standards of are available. With the method obtained in the study, an analytical method has been developed which gives accurate and reliable results for the determination residues of 266 pesticides in foods. When the relevant literature is examined, it has been determined that some studies have been carried out to analyze some of the pesticides that can be detected by gas chromatography. The numbers of pesticides which can be analyzed in these studies were 212. The method developed in this study was assessed to have qualities that could be regarded as one of the best methods among the previous studies in terms of the number of active substances, has the number of active substances are 266 and has the short duration of the analysis.