LC simultaneous determination of thioctic acid, benfotiamine and cyanocobalamin in thiotacid compound capsules

Abstract

A simple, selective, sensitive, precise, simultaneous liquid chromatographic analysis of capsules containing thioctic acid, benfotiamine and cyanocobalamin was described. Good chromatographic separation was achieved using a Zorbax C18 (4.6 cm × 250 mm, 5 μm) and a mobile phase consisting of acetonitrile–phosphate buffer pH 3.5 (15:85, v/v) at a flow rate of 0.9 mL min−1. The ultraviolet detector was set a wavelength of 280 nm. Thioctic acid, benfotiamine and cyanocobalamin were eluted at 2.869, 3.752 and 13.689 min, respectively. The linear ranges for thioctic acid, benfotiamine and cyanocobalamin were 30–180, 4–24 and 0.025–0.150 μg mL−1, respectively. The recoveries of thioctic acid, benfotiamine and cyanocobalamine in pharmaceutical preparation were all greater than 98% and their relative standard deviations were less than 2.0%. The limits of detection were 2.57, 0.19 and 0.003 μg mL−1 for thioctic acid, benfotiamine and cyanocobalamin, respectively.