Cyclodextrin-Modified Gold Nanoparticle Capillary Electrochromatography with Online Sample Stacking for Simultaneous and Sensitive Determination of Aminobenzoic Acid Isomers

A newly-developed method of complete separation and sensitive determination of o-, m-, and p-aminobenzoic acid isomers was achieved by combining open-tubular columns for capillary electrochromatography (OT-CEC) and online sample stacking. In this study, spherical gold nanoparticles were modified by a covalent attachment of mono-6-thio-β-cyclodextrin, and OT-CEC was formed by immobilizing cyclodextrin-modified gold nanoparticles (CD-AuNP) on prederivatized 3-mercaptopropyl-trimethoxysilane fused-silica capillaries. Based on the theory of moving chemical reaction boundary, effects of several important factors such as the pH and concentration of running buffer and the conditions of stacking analytes were optimized. The optimized separations were carried out in 58 mmol/L HAc buffer at pH 3.0 using a capillary coated with CD-AuNP, while the optimized concentration was carried out in 50 mmol/L disodium hydrogen phosphate (pH 9.5). The linear ranges for m-, p-, and o-aminobenzoic acid were from 5.0 × 10−4–0.1, 5.0 × 10−4–0.1 and 1.0 × 10−4–0.1 mmol/L, respectively. And the detection limits (S/N = 3) were as low as 8.22 × 10−5, 8.21 × 10−5, and 3.76 × 10−5 mmol/L for m-, p-, and o-aminobenzoic acid, respectively. The run-to-run, day-to-day, and column-to-column reproducibilities of migration time were satisfactory with relative standard deviation values of less than 4.5 % in all cases. This method was successfully used in determining procaine hydrochloride injection sample with recoveries in the range of 96.1–106.6 % and relative standard deviations less than 5.0 %.