Liquid-liquid Extraction Procedure Research Articles

A Direct Aqueous Derivatization GSMS Method for Determining Benzoylecgonine Concentrations in Human Urine.

A sensitive and reliable method for extraction and quantification of benzoylecgonine (BZE) and cocaine (COC) in urine is presented. Propyl-chloroformate was used as derivatizing agent, and it was directly added to the urine sample: the propyl derivative and COC were then recovered by liquid-liquid extraction procedure. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry was used to detect the analytes in selected ion monitoring mode. The method proved to be precise for BZE and COC both in term of intraday and interday analysis, with a coefficient of variation (CV)<6%. Limits of detection (LOD) were 2.7 ng/mL for BZE and 1.4 ng/mL for COC. The calibration curve showed a linear relationship for BZE and COC (r2>0.999 and >0.997, respectively) within the range investigated. The method, applied to thirty authentic samples, showed to be very simple, fast, and reliable, so it can be easily applied in routine analysis for the quantification of BZE and COC in urine samples.

Development of an LC-MS/MS method for simultaneous determination of memantine and donepezil in rat plasma and its application to pharmacokinetic study.

Recently, a fixed dose combination (FDC) of memantine (MM) and donepezil (DPZ) has been approved for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease (AD). In the present work, a liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method for the simultaneous determination of MM and DPZ was developed and validated in rat plasma over the linearity range of 0.2-400ng/mL using amantadine (AM) as an internal standard. Both the analytes and IS were extracted using one step liquid-liquid extraction procedure. The analytes were separated on C18 reversed phase column with mobile phase consisting of a mixture of methanol and 10mM ammonium acetate, pH 5 (92:8 v/v) at a flow rate of 0.7mL/min. The detection of the analytes was done on triple quadrupole mass spectrometer operated in positive electrospray ionization mode (ESI) and quantified using multiple reaction monitoring (MRM). The method was fully validated in terms of linearity, accuracy, precision, recovery, matrix effect, dilution integrity, carry-over effect and stability. The within- and between-run precisions were <10% and accuracy was all within ±10%. The mean recovery of MM and DPZ was found to be greater than 80%. The % RSD value at higher as well as lower concentration was well within the acceptable range (±15%) in all the stability experiments. The method was successfully applied to the oral pharmacokinetics and drug-drug interaction study of MM and DPZ in male Sprague Dawley (SD) rats.

Simple and sensitive GC/MS-method for the quantification of urinary phenol, o- and m-cresol and ethylphenols as biomarkers of exposure to industrial solvents.

We have developed and validated a simple and sensitive method for the determination of urinary phenol as well as the urinary metabolites of toluene and ethylbenzene in one analytical run. After enzymatic hydrolysis for the cleavage of conjugates overnight, the analytes are extracted from the matrix with a liquid-liquid extraction procedure using toluene as solvent under acidic conditions. The analytes are then derivatised to volatile ethers using N,O-bis(trimethylsilyl) trifluoroacetamid (BSTFA) for cresols and ethylphenols as well as N-tert-butyldimethylsilyl-N-methyltrifluoroacetamid (MTBSTFA) for the determination of phenol. Separation and detection was carried out using capillary gas chromatography with mass-selective detection (GC-MS). Deuterium-labeled o-cresol served as internal standard for the quantification of all metabolites and guaranteed good accuracy of the results. No matrix effects were observed in the quantification of the analytes. The limit of detection for o- and m-cresol and 2- and 4-ethylphenol was 10 and 20μg/l urine and linearity ranged up to 3 and 12mg/L urine, respectively. The limit of detection for urinary phenol was 0.5mg/L with a linear range up to 200mg/L. The relative standard deviation of the within-series imprecision ranged between 3.0 and 7.2% at two spiked concentrations of 60 and 400μg/l and the relative recovery was between 84 and 104%, depending on the analyte. The method was successfully applied in proficiency testing for urinary o-cresol and phenol. This method was used for the analysis of urine samples of 17 non-smoking and 13 smoking persons from the general population without known exposure to solvents. Smokers showed a significantly higher excretion of o-cresol (median: 23 vs. 33μg/l), m-cresol (median: 43 vs. 129μg/l) as well as 4-ethylphenol (median: 25 vs. 124μg/l). Especially excretion of 4-ethylphenol was significantly correlated to smoking habits. The method seems to be suitable for biological monitoring of low-level solvent exposures and allows determination of background values in the general population.

Determination of chemotherapeutic drugs in human urine by capillary electrophoresis with UV and fluorimetric detection using solid-supported liquid-liquid extraction for sample clean-up.

Capillary electrophoresis was used for the rapid determination of three chemotherapeutic drugs employed to treat colorectal cancer: irinotecan, tegafur, and leucovorin, and their main metabolites (7-ethyl-10-hydroxycamptothecin and 5-fluorouracil), in human urine samples. A phosphate buffer (pH 11.34; 20 mM) was selected as the background electrolyte. A hydrodynamic injection (9 s, 30 mbar) was applied and the separation was carried out using a separation temperature and voltage of 25°C and 25 kV, respectively. A capillary with two detection windows for serial online UV and fluorescence detection was satisfactorily employed. A solid-supported liquid-liquid extraction procedure was optimized for the clean-up of the urine samples and the extraction of the analytes. Matrix effects were assessed and signal suppression was observed for three of the analytes, thus, matrix-matched calibration was used for compensating residual matrix effects on these analytes. The proposed method allows the separation and quantification of the chemotherapeutics in less than 6 min. Detection limits range between 0.01 and 0.30 mg/L. The method was satisfactorily applied to the determination of the target compounds in human urine samples, with recoveries of 92.4-107.7%.

Sensitive and precise HPLC method with back-extraction clean-up step for the determination of sildenafil in rat plasma and its application to a pharmacokinetic study.

A sensitive HPLC method was developed and validated for the determination of sildenafil concentrations in rat plasma (200 μL) using a liquid-liquid extraction procedure and paroxetine as an internal standard. In order to eliminate interferences and improve the peak shape, a back-extraction into an acidic solution was utilized. Chromatographic separation was achieved on a cyanopropyl bonded-phase column with a mobile phase composed of 50 m m potassium dihydrogen phosphate buffer (pH 4.5) and acetonitrile (75:25, v/v), pumped at the flow rate of 1 mL/min. A UV detector was set at 230 nm. A calibration curve was constructed within a concentration range from 10 to 1500 ng/mL. The limit of detection was 5 ng/mL. The inter- and intra-day precisions of the assay were in the ranges 2.91-7.33 and 2.61-6.18%, respectively, and the accuracies for inter- and intra-day runs were within 0.14-3.92 and 0.44-2.96%, respectively. The recovery of sildenafil was 85.22 ± 4.54%. Tests confirmed the stability of sildenafil in plasma during three freeze-thaw cycles and during long-term storage at -20 and -80°C for up to 2 months. The proposed method was successfully applied to a pharmacokinetic study in rats.

The absolute bioavailability investigation of LS177 in rats using ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry.

LS177 is a novel inhibitor of mesenchymal epithelial transition (MET) that was used as an anticancer agent. The present study was to evaluate the absolute bioavailability of LS177 in rats. A rapid and sensitive ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS) method has been developed and validated for the determination of LS177 in rat plasma. LS177 and internal standard (IS, LS410) were extracted from rat plasma samples by protein precipitation (PPT) for intravenous group and liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) procedure for oral group, then separated on a Phenomenex Kinetex XB-C18 (2.1 mm I.D. × 50 mm, 2.6 µm) using a mobile phase consisting of 0.1% formic acid in acetonitrile-0.1% formic acid water with a gradient elution program. The standard curves were linear over the ranges of 5.0-2000.0 ng · mL(-1) for PPT and 1.0-200.0 ng · mL(-1) for LLE. The mean recovery of LS177 was greater than 83.4% for PPT and not less than 88.5% for LLE, respectively. The intra- and inter-day accuracy and precision were within the acceptable limits of less than 15.0% at all concentrations. The validated method was successfully applied to the bioavailability study in rat plasma of LS177 and its absolute bioavailability was 25.37%.

Liquid-liquid extraction and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry detection of curcuminoids from bacterial culture medium.

Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) has been used to detect polyphenolic curcuminoids found in turmeric but studies of metabolism by bacterial and mammalian cells in vitro are compromised by poor recovery from the culture medium. We report a liquid-liquid extraction procedure with ethyl acetate and use LC-MS to quantify extracted curcuminoids. Ethyl acetate allows recoveries of ∼ 80-86% of curcuminoids from the bacterial growth medium, bacterial cell lysate and combined bacterial cell and growth medium matrices; a clear improvement over acetonitrile where recoveries were ∼ 25-66%. This optimised method will enable studies of curcuminoid metabolism and may be applicable to other hydrophobic polyphenolic compounds.

Determination of kurarinone in rat plasma by UPLC-MS/MS.

A sensitive and rapid ultra performance liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS/MS) method was developed to determine kurarinone in rat plasma using chlorzoxazone as the internal standard (IS). Sample preparation was accomplished through a liquid-liquid extraction procedure with ethyl acetate to 0.2 mL plasma sample. The analyte and IS were separated on an Acquity UPLC BEH C18 column (2.1 mm × 50 mm, 1.7 μm) with the mobile phase of acetonitrile and 1% formic acid in water with gradient elution at a flow rate of 0.40 mL/min. The detection was performed on a triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometer equipped with electrospray ionization (ESI) by multiple reactions monitoring (MRM) of the transitions at m/z 437.0→301.2 for kurarinone and m/z 168.1→132.1 for IS. The linearity of this method was found to be within the concentration range of 20-2000 ng/mL with a lower limit of quantification of 20 ng/mL. Only 3.0 min was needed for an analytical run. The matrix effect was 94.7-107.2% for kurarinone. The intra- and inter-day precision (RSD%) were less than 8.2% and accuracy (RE%) was within ±9.0%. The recovery ranged from 77.3% to 85.6%. Kurarinone was sufficiently stable under all relevant analytical conditions. The method was also successfully applied to the pharmacokinetic study of kurarinone in rats.

Simultaneous Determination of Oleanolic and Ursolic Acids in Rat Plasma by HPLC-MS: Application to a Pharmacokinetic Study After Oral Administration of Different Combinations of QingGanSanJie Decoction Extracts.

A liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry method has been developed and validated for rapid simultaneous determination of the oleanolic and ursolic acid contents in rat plasma with betulinic acid as the internal standard (IS). The plasma samples were prepared by a liquid-liquid extraction procedure. Chromatographic separation was performed with a Chromasil-C18 column (250 mm × 4.6 mm, i.d. 5 μm) with methanol-water as mobile phase at 1 mL/min. The detection was accomplished under selected-ion-monitoring mode with a negative electrospray ionization interface. Linear calibration curves were obtained between the range of 0.86-421.2 and 0.94-462.0 ng/mL for oleanolic and ursolic acids, with lower limits of quantification at 0.43 and 0.47 ng/mL, respectively. The extraction recovery exceeded 70% in plasma. The intra- and interday precision values were <9.8% with the accuracy as -7.0 to 9.9% at three different QC levels in both cases. The pharmacokinetic behaviors of oral dosage of QingGanSanJie decoctions were then studied in rats following the developed approach. The t1/2 values of the oleanolic and ursolic acids after oral administration of the monarch medicine extract were significantly different (P < 0.05) from other prescription extracts containing different herb pieces with different compatibilities. Bimodal phenomena appeared in every concentration-time curve for the oleanolic and ursolic acids at 3-8 h after administration. The minister, assistant and guide medicines in the formula could prolong the metabolism of the oleanolic and ursolic acids in vivo, providing an experimental basis for the slow onset and long action of the Traditional Chinese Medicine compound.

Investigations into distribution of lidocaine in human autopsy material.

With screening methods in the legal medicine drugs were often detected in autopsy material. In this study the antiarrhythmic and the local anesthetic drug lidocaine could be proved in fifty-one cases and determined in different autopsy materials. For the first time the comparison of so many distribution patterns of lidocaine in human compartments was possible. A liquid-liquid extraction procedure, a standard addition method and LC/MS/MS were used for analytics. The measured concentrations in blood were in the therapeutic range or lower. The time between lidocaine application and death was given in twenty-nine cases. These data were very helpful to estimate and interpret the distribution process of lidocaine between application and death. This time exerted a crucial influence on the distribution of lidocaine in the compartments. Most of the intravenous applicated lidocaine was found in heart blood after a very short time of distribution. Afterwards the highest concentrations were measured in brain. Later the highest concentration was found in the kidney samples or in urine. If the time between lidocaine application and death is known, the results of this study can be used to deepen the knowledge of its pharmacokinetics. If this time is unknown, the circumstances and the causes of death can be better explained.

Rapid determination of ruscogenin in rat plasma with application to pharmacokinetic study.

A sensitive and rapid ultra performance liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS/MS) method was developed to determine ruscogenin in rat plasma using midazolam as the internal standard (IS). Sample preparation was accomplished through a liquid-liquid extraction procedure with ethyl acetate to 0.2mL plasma sample. The analyte and IS were separated on an Acquity UPLC BEH C18 column (2.1mm×50mm, 1.7μm) with the mobile phase of acetonitrile and 1% formic acid in water with gradient elution at a flow rate of 0.40mL/min. Ruscogenin and IS were eluted at 1.74 and 1.11min, respectively. The detection was performed on a triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometer equipped with positive-ion electrospray ionization (ESI) by multiple reactions monitoring (MRM) of the transitions at m/z 431.2→287.0 for ruscogenin and m/z 326.2→291.1 for IS. The linearity of this method was found to be within the concentration range of 2-1000ng/mL with a lower limit of quantification of 2ng/mL. Only 2.0min was needed for an analytical run. The matrix effect was 92.4-107.3% for ruscogenin. The intra- and inter-day precision (RSD%) were less than 11.2% and accuracy (RE%) was within ±9.8%. The recovery ranged from 75.4% to 86.3%. Ruscogenin was sufficiently stable under all relevant analytical conditions. The method was also successfully applied to the pharmacokinetic study of ruscogenin in rats.

Rapid analysis of pharmaceuticals and personal care products in fish plasma micro-aliquots using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry

A sensitive analytical method based on liquid–liquid extraction (LLE) and liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) was developed for rapid analysis of 11 pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) in fish plasma micro-aliquots (∼20μL). Target PPCPs included, bisphenol A, carbamazepine, diclofenac, fluoxetine, gemfibrozil, ibuprofen, naproxen, risperidone, sertraline, simvastatin and triclosan. A relatively quicker and cheaper LLE procedure exhibited comparable analyte recoveries with solid-phase extraction. Rapid separation and analysis of target compounds in fish plasma extracts was achieved by employing a high efficiency C-18 HPLC column (Agilent Poroshell 120 SB-C18, 2.1mm×50mm, 2.7μm) and fast polarity switching, enabling effective monitoring of positive and negative ions in a single 9min run. With the exception of bisphenol A, which exhibited relatively high background contamination, method detection limits of individual PPCPs ranged between 0.15 and 0.69pg/μL, while method quantification limits were between 0.05 and 2.3pg/μL. Mean matrix effect (ME) values ranged between 65 and 156% for the various target analytes. Isotope dilution quantification using isotopically labelled internal surrogates was utilized to correct for signal suppression or enhancement and analyte losses during sample preparation. The method was evaluated by analysis of 20μL plasma micro-aliquots collected from zebrafish (Danio rerio) from a laboratory bioaccumulation study, which included control group fish (no exposure), as well as fish exposed to environmentally relevant concentrations of PPCPs. Using the developed LC–MS/MS based method, concentrations of the studied PPCPs were consistently detected in the low pg/μL (ppb) range. The method may be useful for investigations requiring fast, reliable concentration measurements of PPCPs in fish plasma. In particular, the method may be applicable for in situ contaminant biomonitoring, as well as bioaccumulation and toxicology studies employing small fishes with low blood compartment volumes.

Revival of physostigmine – a novel HPLC assay for simultaneous determination of physostigmine and its metabolite eseroline designed for a pharmacokinetic study of septic patients

Physostigmine, commonly used as an antidote in anticholinergic poisoning, is reported to have additional pharmacological effects, such as activation of the cholinergic anti-inflammatory pathway in sepsis models. Due to the narrow therapeutic range of physostigmine and its metabolite eseroline, however, the plasma concentrations of these substances need to be determined so as to understand their effect and ensure safety in the treatment of septic patients. To determine physostigmine and its metabolite eseroline, a rapid and sensitive high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method has been developed and validated. Spiked plasma samples were cleaned up and concentrated using a simple liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) procedure with N-methylphysostigmine as internal standard. Separation was achieved using reversed-phase HPLC on a Kinetex C18 column with gradient elution and fluorescence detection (254 nm excitation/355 nm emission). LLE produced clean extracts and a mean recovery of 80.3% for eseroline and 84.9% for physostigmine. The HPLC assay revealed a limit of detection (LOD) of 0.025 ng/mL and a lower limit of quantification (LLOQ) of 0.05 ng/mL for both analytes. Linearity was observed at 0.05-10.0 ng/mL (r²>0.999). Intra- and inter-day precision ranged from 0.7% to 6.6%, and intra- and inter-day accuracy 97.5%-110.0%. The presented method is useful for human drug level monitoring of physostigmine and eseroline in accordance with current guidelines. Remarkably low plasma concentrations can be quantified after LLE with gradient elution and fluorescence detection, making this a suitable method for pharmacokinetic studies in a clinical setting.

Fast and Sensitive Chiral Analysis of Amphetamines and Cathinones in Equine Urine and Plasma Using Liquid Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometry

A simple, rapid, sensitive and reproducible method for enantiomer analysis of methamphetamine, amphetamine, cathinone and methcathinone was developed and validated. The compounds were extracted from equine plasma and urine using a fast liquid-liquid extraction procedure. Only one milliliter plasma and one hundred microliter urine sample is needed for analysis. The extraction procedure had good recovery (>70%) and the matrix effect was negligible. Enantiomer differentiation and confirmation were achieved using liquid chromatography with chiral stationary phase and mass spectrometry detection. The method demonstrated excellent reproducibility with intra-day and inter-day precision of lower than 5%. The lower limits of detection for all of the compounds studied here were at low pg/mL level for both plasma and urine. This is the first report of the analysis of four chiral compounds in equine plasma and urine. Routine application was demonstrated for (S)- and (R)-enantiomer differentiation.

Multiresidue Determination of β2-Agonists Including Phenylethanolamine A in Animal-Derived Food by Ultra-High Performance Liquid Chromatography/Tandem Mass Spectrometry.

A comprehensive ultra-high performance liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC/MS/MS) procedure for detection of nine β-agonists in animal-derived food is described. The method was based on enzymatic hydrolysis with β-glucuronidase from Helix pomatia, followed by a liquid-liquid extraction procedure with perchloric acid and a solid-phase extraction scheme using two kinds of cartridges, HLB and MCX. The influence of sample solution pH in the extraction recovery was studied, and pH 4.0 was found to give the best recovery. The analytes were eluted with methanol containing 4% ammonia. A validation procedure for quantitative analysis of β-agonists in animal-derived food was performed. The three kinds of internal standards, d3-salbutamol, d6-ractopamine and d9-clenpenterol, were applied in the sample preparation and detection of UHPLC/MS/MS. The recoveries from spiked samples ranged between 74.9 and 106.9%. The relative standard deviations of detection were at 0.7-9.6%. The limits of detection and quantification were 0.01-0.05 and 0.03-0.20 µg/kg, respectively. The effect of sample matrix in the detection was discussed in detail.

Gas Chromatographic Method for the Analysis of Organic Acids in the Bio-Catalytic Conversion Process.

An analytical method for the quantification of acrylic acid (AA), 1,3-propanediol (1,3-PD) and 3-hydroxypropionic acid (3-HP) in the bio-catalytic conversion process has been developed by gas chromatography. A simple liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) procedure was used in the sample preparation. Organic acid additives such as trifluoroacetic acid were used to improve the extraction efficiency in the LLE procedure. Under optimum analysis conditions, all analytes were satisfactorily separated with no interference. In standard calibration, all correlation coefficients (r(2)) were better than or equal to 0.994. In culture media, the intra-batch precision (% relative standard deviation) and recovery (%) as the average value of the quality control samples were 2.3 and 102.4%, respectively. In addition, the inter-batch precision and recovery as the average value of the quality control samples were 5.0 and 104.0%, respectively. In phosphate buffer, the intra-batch precision and recovery as the average value of the quality control samples were 2.7 and 101.6%, respectively. In addition, the inter-batch precision and recovery as the average value of the quality control samples were 2.9 and 101.7%, respectively. The limit of detection (S/N ratio: 3) and limit of quantification (S/N ratio: 10) were 1.0 and 3.5 µg/mL, 3.0 and 10.0 µg/mL, and 9.0 and 30.0 µg/mL, respectively, for AA, 1,3-PD and 3-HP. Consequently, this method was demonstrated to be acceptable for the quantitative analysis of AA, 1,3-PD and 3-HP in culture media and phosphate buffer.

Gas pressure assisted microliquid-liquid extraction coupled online to direct infusion mass spectrometry: a new automated screening platform for bioanalysis.

In the field of bioanalysis, there is an increasing demand for miniaturized, automated, robust sample pretreatment procedures that can be easily connected to direct-infusion mass spectrometry (DI-MS) in order to allow the high-throughput screening of drugs and/or their metabolites in complex body fluids like plasma. Liquid-Liquid extraction (LLE) is a common sample pretreatment technique often used for complex aqueous samples in bioanalysis. Despite significant developments that have been made in automated and miniaturized LLE procedures, fully automated LLE techniques allowing high-throughput bioanalytical studies on small-volume samples using direct infusion mass spectrometry, have not been matured yet. Here, we introduce a new fully automated micro-LLE technique based on gas-pressure assisted mixing followed by passive phase separation, coupled online to nanoelectrospray-DI-MS. Our method was characterized by varying the gas flow and its duration through the solvent mixture. For evaluation of the analytical performance, four drugs were spiked to human plasma, resulting in highly acceptable precision (RSD down to 9%) and linearity (R(2) ranging from 0.990 to 0.998). We demonstrate that our new method does not only allow the reliable extraction of analytes from small sample volumes of a few microliters in an automated and high-throughput manner, but also performs comparable or better than conventional offline LLE, in which the handling of small volumes remains challenging. Finally, we demonstrate the applicability of our method for drug screening on dried blood spots showing excellent linearity (R(2) of 0.998) and precision (RSD of 9%). In conclusion, we present the proof of principe of a new high-throughput screening platform for bioanalysis based on a new automated microLLE method, coupled online to a commercially available nano-ESI-DI-MS.

Simultaneous determination of four anthraquinones in rat plasma by HPLC-FLD method and its pharmacokinetic study

This paper aims to develop a method for the determination of aloe-emodin, rhein, chrysophanol and physcion and study the pharmacokinetic properties of four anthraquinones in rat plasma after oral administration of gardenia and rhubarb decoction. The plasma concentrations at different time points of four anthraquinones were determined by HPLC-FLD method. Plasma samples were extracted with liquid-liquid extraction procedure. Plasma samples were separated on a C18 column (4.6 mm x 150 mm, 5 μm), using 0.2% acetic acid and methanol as mobile phase at a flow rate of 1.0 mL min(-1) with gradient elution. The excitation and emission wavelengths were set at 430, 525 nm, respectively. DAS 2.0 software was applied to calculate the pharmacokinetic parameters. The results showed four anthraquinones can be absorbed. The main parameters of aloe-emodin, rhein, chrysophanol and physcion were as follows: C(max) for aloe-emodin was (0.085 ± 0.058), (3.772 ± 1.152), (0.464 ± 0.267), (0.028 ± 0.008) mg x L(-1) respectively; t(max) for rhein was (1.042 ± 0.510), (0.805 ± 0.307), (1.167 ± 0.283), (0.616 ± 0.162) h respectively; t½ for chrysophanol was (3.557 ± 1.250), (6.879 ± 1.126), (5.196 ± 2.032), (4.337 ± 1.816) h; AUC(0-t) for physcion was (0.504 ± 0.130), (9.558 ± 1.106), (2.545 ± 1.554), (0.052 ± 0.018) mg x h x L(-1). This paper developed a selective, accurate and sensitive HPLC-FLD method for the simultaneous determination of four anthraquiones in rat plasma.

Simultaneous determination of five anthraquinones in a Chinese traditional preparation by RP-HPLC using an improved extraction procedure

The stable quality of Chinese herbal medicines is a critical factor for their reliable clinical efficiency. An improved liquid-liquid extraction procedure and a liquid chromatographic method were developed to simultaneously analyze five anthraquinones (aloe-emodin, rhein, emodin, chrysophanol and physcion) in a Chinese traditional hospital preparation, Fuyankang mixture, in order to quantitatively control its quality in a more effective way. A more economical and repeatable extraction procedure based on conventional liquid-liquid extraction technique was developed and used to extract five marker components in Fuyankang mixture. These anthraquinones were separated in less than 20 min on a C18 column with methanol and 0.1% phosphoric acid (88:12, v/v) as mobile phase. The method was validated for specificity, precision, spiked recovery and stability. Compared to conventional liquid-liquid extraction, the improved liquid-liquid extraction was found to be more effective for simultaneous extraction of anthraquinones from an aqueous Chinese herbal preparation, especially for hydrophobic compounds. The improved extraction method was successfully applied to determine the content of five marker components in Fuyankang mixture by the means of reverse phase high-performance liquid chromatography. The improved extraction procedure may be suitable for routine quality control of Fuyankang mixture and other traditional preparations at city-level hospitals in China.

UPLC-MS/MS determination of thiamphenicol in human plasma and its application to a pharmacokinetic study.

A sensitive and rapid ultra performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS/MS) method was developed to determine thiamphenicol (TAP) in human plasma using chlorzoxazone as the internal standard (IS). Sample preparation was accomplished through a liquid-liquid extraction procedure with ethyl acetate to precipitation of plasma protein, and to a 0.1 mL plasma sample. The analyte and IS were separated on an Acquity UPLC BEH C18 column (2.1 mm × 50 mm, 1.7 μm) with the mobile phase of acetonitrile and 1% formic acid in water with gradient elution at a flow rate of 0.40 mL/min. The detection was performed on a triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometer equipped with electrospray ionization (ESI) by multiple reactions monitoring (MRM) of the transitions at m/z 354.3→185.1 for TAP and m/z 168.1→132.1 for IS. The linearity of this method was found to be within the concentration range of 10-8000 ng/mL with a lower limit of quantification of 10 ng/mL. Only 1.5 min was needed for an analytical run. The method herein described was superior to previous methods and was successfully applied to the pharmacokinetic study of TAP in healthy Chinese volunteers after oral administration.