Application Note : 015
Title of application :
Simultaneous chiral separation of tramadol and its metabolites
Area of application :
Chiral separation/pharmaceutical analysis
Conditions :
| Buffer | Chiral-01, pH=3.0 |
| Sample | Standard mixture consisting of tramadol, N-demethyltramadol and O-demethyltramadol |
| Capillary | 50 mm i.d, 50 cm length; |
| Injection mode | Hydrodynamic injection |
| Separation setting | + 20kV |
| Instrument used | CE-L1, UV detection at 210 nm |
Description :
Chiral separation of drugs by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) can be very
costly, due either to the usage of an expensive chiral column or to the need for a large
amount of chiral modifier for the mobile phase. Moreover, the chiral resolution achieved
with HPLC is often mediocre because of the limited column efficiency of HPLC.
Capillary electrophoresis (CE) is particularly useful in chiral analysis. This is because chiral separation by CE involves essentially the formulation of a running buffer that is of chiral discriminating capability. The small volume for the buffer (typically a few milliliters) means even relatively expensive chial additives can be employed. Furthermore, changing chiral selectivity in CE can be realized by simply flushing out the original running solution and refilling with the new one. This enables a rapid identification of the optimal chiral separation conditions. Convenience in the optimization of the chiral discriminating system, combined with its intrinsic high column efficiency, often makes CE to be the most cost effiective approach for implementing the chiral separation of a number of compounds, especially pharmaceuticals.
Here, the exceptional performance of CE is exemplified by the simultaneous chiral separation of tramadol, an analgesic drug, and its N-demethyl and O-demethyl metabolites.
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