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. 2017 Nov 21:6:2034.
doi: 10.12688/f1000research.13035.2. eCollection 2017.

Identification of organic pigments in tattoo inks and permanent make-up using laser desorption ionisation mass spectrometry

Affiliations

Identification of organic pigments in tattoo inks and permanent make-up using laser desorption ionisation mass spectrometry

Markus Niederer et al. F1000Res. .

Abstract

Nowadays, about 12% of the European and 20% of the US population are tattooed. Rising concerns regarding consumer safety, led to legal restrictions on tattoo and permanent make-up (PMU) inks. Restrictions also include bans on certain colourants. Both ink types use organic pigments for colour-giving, plus inorganic pigments for white and black and colour tones. Pigments are only sparingly soluble in common solvents and occur as suspended particles in the ink matrix. Their detection and identification therefore pose a major challenge for laboratories involved in monitoring the legal compliance of tattoo inks and PMU. We overcame this challenge by developing a direct laser desorption ionisation time-of-flight mass spectrometry method, which included an easy sample clean up. The method proved to be capable of detecting and identifying organic pigments in almost all of the tested ink samples. Method validation and routine deployment during market surveys showed the method to be fit for purpose. Pigment screening of 396 tattoo inks and 55 PMU taken from the Swiss market between 2009 and 2017 lead to the following conclusions: Pigment variety is much greater in tattoo inks (18) than in PMU (10); four prohibited pigments (Pigment Green 7, Pigment Red 122, Pigment Violet 19 and 23) were found in both ink types; for PMU, these four pigments made up 12% of the pigment findings, compared to 32% for tattoo inks. Therefore, legal compliance of PMU was at a higher level. A comparison of pigments found with those declared on tattoo ink labels clearly showed that banned pigments are rarely declared, but rather masked by listing non present legal pigments and label forging; therefore, highlighting the urgency of widespread market controls.

Keywords: MALDI-TOF; PMUs; colour pigments; tattoo inks.

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Conflict of interest statement

No competing interests were disclosed.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
High resolution mass spectra of Pigment Green 36 (C.I. 74265) without any discrimination effect ( A) and affected by the surfactant Triton X-100 ( B).
Figure 2.
Figure 2.. Head to tail plot of three pigments identified in the mass spectra of a red tattoo ink sample by NIST software: C.I.73915 (Pigment Red 122, R. Match = 878), C.I.21110 (Pigment Orange 13, R. Match = 833) and C.I.12475 (Pigment Red 170, R. Match = 780).
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Verification of the prohibited violet pigment C.I. 51319 in a tattoo ink sample by high resolution mass spectra ( A) and standard addition ( B), as well as the exclusion of a legal red (C.I. 12477) and blue (C.I. 74160) reference pigment ( C) in the sample.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.
LDI mass spectra of pigment Yellow 12 (C.I. 21090) without matrix ( A) and MALDI spectra of the same pigment with DHB as a matrix ( B).

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References

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Grants and funding

The author(s) declared that no grants were involved in supporting this work.

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