A convenient UHPLC-MS/MS method for routine monitoring of plasma and brain levels of nicotine and cotinine as a tool to validate newly developed preclinical smoking model in mouse

摘要

BackgroundA sensitive, rapid and selective UHPLC–MS/MS method has been developed and validated for the quantification of Nicotine (NT) and Cotinine (CN) using Continine-d 3 as internal standard (IS) as per FDA guidelines. Sample preparation involved simple protein precipitation of 20 µL mouse plasma or brain homogenate using acetonitrile at 1:8 ratio. Mass Spectrometer was operated in positive polarity under the multiple reaction-monitoring mode using electro spray ionization technique and the transitions of m/z 163.2 → 132.1, 177.2 → 98.0 and 180.2 → 101.2 were used to measure the NT, CN and IS, respectively. The elution of NT, CN and IS are at 1.89, 1.77 and 1.76 min, respectively. This was achieved with a gradient mobile phase consisting of 5 mM ammonium bicarbonate, acetonitrile and methanol (3:1, v/v) at a flow rate of 0.3 mL/min on a Kinetex EVO C18 column. The method was validated with a lower limit of quantitation 3.0 ng/mL in mouse plasma and brain for both the analytes.