Separation and quantification of 9‐(alkylthio)acridines by capillary micellar electrokinetic chromatography and capillary liquid chromatography

Abstract

Various thioacridine derivatives are potential chemotherapeutics against various diseases which are intensively synthesized, characterized, and investigated by many research groups. Efficient, fast, and reliable separation and quantification methods for their analysis are still to be developed. MEKC and capillary LC (CLC) were applied for the separation and quantification of five highly hydrophobic, weakly basic, and structurally similar 9-(alkylthio)acridines. Since the common anionic and cationic surfactants failed to separate the strongly hydrophobic thioacridines by MEKC, sodium cholate was used in an alkaline BGE and successfully employed for their fast separation. In CLC, the weakly basic nature of the thioacridines necessitated use of LiChrosorb RP-select B sorbent as the stationary phase, which combined with a very simple mobile phase methanol/water yielded an efficient chromatographic separation system. Both, the MEKC and CLC optimized separation methods were then applied to quantify the thioacridines within a concentration range of 1.0 x 10(-5)-1.0 x 10(-3) mol/L and the obtained experimental results were critically compared. In practical terms, the MEKC analytical method can quantify the analytes much faster but with a lower reliability while the CLC method performs slower analysis with a higher repeatability of the experimental results.

Micellar electrokinetic chromatography: Methodological and instrumental advances focused on practical aspects

“…In general, the methods reported have been developed in order to determine analytes of clinical and pharmaceutical interest in different samples, and only some of them are worth pointing out. Regarding bile salts, SC micelles have been used for the separation of bioactive licorice compounds 77 (alkyltio)acridines 90 amino acids after derivatization with phanquinone 91 four streoisomers of palonosetron hydrochloride 92, whereas sodium deoxycholate was a useful PSP for the separation of nitrofuran antibiotics 93 and a mixture of herbs commonly present in herbal Chinese formulas 94. Mixed micelles of SC with SDS 95 or another bile salt like taurine 96 have also been reported for the separation of ten flavonoid aglycons belonging to four different classes, and for the determination of shikimate in raw plant extracts, respectively.…”

MEKC as a powerful growing analytical technique

“…The extended application of MEKC in cancer research has been reported in several publications 213, 286–290. MEKC has been used to explore different aspects of cancer research from the search for biological markers in serum, urine, and tissue, to epidemiological studies, to the exploration of anticancer drugs in plant and marine organisms 291.…”