Comparison of LC and UPLC coupled to MS-MS for the determination of sulfonamides in egg and honey

摘要

Determination of ten sulfonamides (SAs) in egg and honey has been compared using column liquid chromatography (LC) and ultra-performance liquid chromatography (UPLC) coupled to tandem mass spectrometry (MS-MS). A liquid-liquid extraction with acetonitrile followed by solid-phase extraction on a Strata-X cartridge was developed for sample preparation. The analytical performance of both methods was compared applying the alternative matrix-comprehensive in-house validation approach using specially designed software InterVal (TM). Using UPLC the separation time was shortened about 30% reducing the run time by 8 min and a better resolution was achieved compared to LC. Due to higher peak efficiency achieved with UPLC, the decision limit values obtained by both techniques were almost equal (6.61-9.43 mu g kg(-1) and 7.25-11.9 mu g kg(-1) for UPLC and LC, respectively), despite the fact that in UPLC twice lower sample volumes were injected. Satisfactory and comparable recoveries (80-110%) were obtained by UPLC and LC for all the SAs, except for sulfacetamide by LC and sulfabenzamide by both methods. For a majority of the spiked compounds, UPLC gave significantly better precision.