Abstract
Due to their simplicity, speed and low cost, chemical spot tests are increasingly demanded for the presumptive identification of illicit drugs in a variety of contexts such as point-of-care assistance or prosecution of drug trafficking. However, most of the colorimetric reactions used in these tests are, at best, drug class selective. Therefore, the development of tests based on chemical reactions with improved discrimination power is of great interest. In this work, we propose a new colorimetric assay for amphetamine (AMP) based on its reaction with solutions of alkaline gold bromide to form an insoluble yellow–orange derivative. The resulting suspensions are then filtered onto nylon membranes and the precipitate collected is used for the visual identification of AMP. The measurement of the absorbance of the membranes by diffuse reflectance spectroscopy also allows the quantification of AMP in a simple and rapid way, as demonstrated for different synthetic and drug street samples. On the basis of the results obtained, it was concluded that the proposed procedure is highly selective towards AMP, as this compound could be easily differentiated from other common drugs such as methamphetamine (MET), ephedrine (EPH), scopolamine (SCP) and cocaine (COC).
Highlights
The consumption of illicit drugs, and the criminal activities associated with their production and marketing, continue to grow each year [1]
We propose a new colorimetric assay for amphetamine (AMP) based on its reaction with solutions of alkaline gold bromide to form an insoluble yellow–orange derivative
On the basis of the results obtained, it was concluded that the proposed procedure is highly selective towards AMP, as this compound could be differentiated from other common drugs such as methamphetamine (MET), ephedrine (EPH), scopolamine (SCP) and cocaine (COC)
Summary
The consumption of illicit drugs, and the criminal activities associated with their production and marketing, continue to grow each year [1]. The analytical strategy to be applied depends on the intended purpose of the analysis, and a variety of approaches are in current use, from those involving highly sophisticated chromatographic equipment coupled to spectrometers and/or chemometric data treatment [3,4,5] to simple chemical spot tests [6,7]. The former approaches are typically used to analyze complex matrices such as biological specimens or for confirmatory purposes, whereas because of their simplicity, speed and low cost, chemical spot tests are preferably used for the presumptive analysis of suspected samples. They are used to reduce the workload of many laboratories by avoiding negative samples to be analyzed by instrumental methods [8,9]
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