Analytical methodologies for identifying a polypeptide antibiotic

Abstract

This article discusses the development of various analytical methods for identification and quantification of residues of antibiotics in meeting international regulatory requirements, and, as an example, overviews the screening, purification, fractionation and analytical assays of bacitracin, a commonly applied polypeptide antibiotic mixture. Attention is focused on the development of chemical methods, as they provide extraordinary performance, in terms of sensitivity and selectivity, for measuring residual levels of the various components of bacitracin in food and other matrices; the non-compound specific biological assay is discussed only briefly. Because of its advantages, state-of-the-art high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled with various detection techniques, in particular mass spectrometry (MS), has recently gained in popularity in confirming and quantifying drug residues. In this article, the authors also outline the latest results on the application of highly sensitive and selective LC-MS in analysis of bacitracin residues in milk and animal tissues. LC-MS is suggested as the technique of choice for confirmation of polar polypeptide antibiotics and the like at trace concentrations.