Challenges of HPLC determination of quinoline derivatives used in the treatment of malaria

Abstract

ABSTRACTFully effective antimalarial drugs are yet to be isolated or synthesized, hence the search them continues. The study was aimed at establishing the most suitable conditions for the separation and determination of six biologically active alkaloids, quinoline derivatives, using high performance liquid chromatography with UV/Vis detection. The experiments involved the following derivatives: quinine, quinidine, cinchonine, cinchonidine, acetylcinchonine and acetylquinidine. Of the six stationary phases used, only the naphthylpropyl column enabled the separation of all alkaloids. The octadecyl column, considered by many analysts as a reference, did not provide successful separation. The naphthylpropyl column had also very good validation parameters, including a wide range of linearity, high values of correlation coefficients (0.9990‒0.9998) and low standard measurement uncertainty (1.8‒2.3 µg L‒1). The newly developed method was employed to evaluate the content of quinine in tonic-like beverages. The naphthylpropyl stationary phase provided ≤5% repeatability of quinine determination.