Analysis of trehalose in transgenic tobacco extracts by high performance liquid chromatography with evaporative light scattering detection

A high performance liquid chromatographic method with ethylenediamine dynamically modified silica column and evaporative light scattering detection (ELSD) was developed for the direct determination of trehalose in transgenic tobacco extracts The separation column (Zorbax Rx SIL, 4 6 mm i d ×250 mm, 5 μm, Hewlett Packard, USA) modified by ethylenediamine and a guard column (Zorbax Rx SIL, 4 6 mm i d ×12 5 mm, 5 μm) were used The mobile phase was a mixture of acetonitrile water(2 6∶1, V/V ) containing 0 03% ethylenediamine Regression equations revealed the linear relationships ( r = 0 996 0 999) between the concentrations and peak areas of carbohydrates detected by ELSD The detection limits of ELSD ( S/N =3∶1) were 10 mg/L, 20 mg/L, 10 mg/L and 10 mg/L for fructose, glucose, sucrose and trehalose, respectively