The high performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method of Flores and Galston (1982 Plant Physiol 69: 701) for the separation and quantitation of benzoylated polyamines in plant tissues has been widely adopted by other workers. However, due to previously unrecognized problems associated with the derivatization of agmatine, this important intermediate in plant polyamine metabolism cannot be quantitated using this method. Also, two polyamines, putrescine and diaminopropane, also are not well resolved using this method. A simple modification of the original HPLC procedure greatly improves the separation and quantitation of these amines, and further allows the simulation analysis of phenethylamine and tyramine, which are major monoamine constituents of tobacco and other plant tissues. We have used this modified HPLC method to characterize amine titers in suspension cultured carrot (Daucus carota L.) cells and tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum L.) leaf tissues.Polyamines are thought to play essential roles in plant growth and development (19). The PA' contents of various plant tissues have been analyzed using several ion exchange, thin-layer and high-performance liquid chromatographic procedures, each of which has its advantages and limitations.Perhaps the most widely used routine analytical method for PAs involves their separation by TLC, following prechromatographic derivatization with dansyl chloride (14). The highly fluorescent products permit excellent detection sensitivity, but quantitation of Dns-PAs on the TLC plate is cumbersome and suffers from the fact that fluorescence yield is modified by temperature, pH, and solvent polarity and the Dns derivatives are photolabile (9). Furthermore, DnsCl reacts not only with amines, but with phenolics and some alcohols, including sugars (16), and these derivatives may mask or interfere with the separation of Dns-amines on the chromatogram. Finally, the quantitation of Agm, or similar polar Dns-amine derivatives in PA mixtures, has not proved feasible using this method. DnsCl shows poor reactivity toward the '