Silvia Marten | Authors

Articles

On-line SPE-LC of Catecholamines in Urine with Fluorescence Detection

Catecholamines are important markers for the diagnosis and management of tumour diseases of the sympathoadrenal system. The major catecholamines are dopamine, norepinephrine and epinephrine. Urine tests have shown to be applicable to measure the level of catecholamines in the human body. Various separation methods have been used for the clean-up of catecholamines in biological fluids: solvent extraction, adsorption on alumina, ion-exchange and solid-phase extraction of a diphenylboronic acid-catecholamine complex. From the point of simplicity, reproducibility and automation the last method is the most suitable and can be realized by on-line SPE–LC. Diphenylborate forms a negatively charged complex with the diol groups of catecholamines. These complexes which are strongly retained on a polystyrene-divinylbenzene cartridge in alkaline medium (pH 8.5) can be eluted in a second step from the SPE unit directly onto the HPLC column. The separation of catecholamines is performed in isocratic mode by..

High Speed Separation of More Than 16 Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons

Polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) are particularly relevant in the analysis of environmental pollution because of their ubiquity, toxicity and persistence. Consequently, the PAHs have become the most intensively studied pollutants in environmental analysis.