Efficient Recognition and Determination of Carbamazepine and Oxcarbazepine in Aqueous and Biological Samples by Molecularly Imprinted Polymers

Abstract

A molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) of carbamazepine (CBZ) was synthesized so as to facilitate the selective extraction of CBZ from aqueous and bio-samples by using a non-covalent imprinting approach. Synthesized materials were characterized with Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy studies. The imprinted polymer was evaluated and applied as a sorbent for solid-phase extraction (SPE) coupled with HPLC-UV to detect CBZ and its metabolite oxcarbazepine (OXC). The optimal conditions for molecularly imprinted SPE (MISPE) consist of the cartridge conditioning using methanol followed by triply distilled water, loading the aqueous sample and elution by methanol-acetic acid (9 : 1, v/v). The selectivity and sensitivity for pre-concentration and separation of the target analytes were studied in details, in order to build a simple and sensitive method which can act as a potential analytical strategy to monitor CBZ and OXC in the environmental and biological samples. The developed method exhibited a wide linear range (1–500 μg/L), good linearity (R2 > 0.990), and relative standard deviation <3%. The molecular recognition properties of the MIP gave rise to good recoveries for CBZ (87–98%) and OXC (72–78%) when spiked aqueous and bio-samples were percolated through the MISPE procedure. The limit of detection for CBZ and OXC were 0.488 and 0.515 μg/L, respectively. Moreover, each MISPE cartridge, when investigated for reusability test, displayed excellent recoveries for CBZ (98–94%) with enhanced reusability (10 cycles).