Stabilizing proteins for affinity capillary electrophoresis using ionic liquid aqueous two phase systems: Pharmaceuticals and human serum albumin.

Recently, ionic liquids (ILs) are finding ever broader scope within pharmaceutical and bioanalytical applications. In the current work, ACE binding measurements of tryptophan (Try)-HSA, chlorambucil (CHL)-HSA, and dacarbazine (DTIC)-HSA complexes were estimated in the absence or presence of several short chain imidazolium ILs within the range of concentrations of 10.0-1000.0 µmol/L that are far below the critical micelle concentrations of ILs. Results indicated that the value of binding constant of Trp-HSA was dramatically deviated in the presence of 1000.0 µmol/L 1-decyl-3-methylimidazolium bromide (DMIMBr) IL. However, interestingly, there is no any deviation for the Trp-HSA binding constant with 100.0 µmol/L 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium bromide (BMIMBr) IL as an adjuvant additive in 67.0 mmol/L phosphate buffer at pH 7.4. This finding was further used to estimate the binding constants of important but weakly binding substances of CHL and DTIC antitumors with HSA; their binding constants were also estimated by HPAC giving data in good agreement with that revealed by ACE. These achievements were attributed to the significant improvement of HSA stability by combination with BMIMBr IL through hydrogen bond, electrostatic, and π-π forces. In addition, the use of 100.0 µmol/L BMIMBr extended the stability of native HSA solution stored under the ambient lab conditions up to 25 days with significant improvements in the precision of ACE binding data.

Eco-friendly ionic liquid assisted capillary electrophoresis and α-acid glycoprotein-assisted liquid chromatography for simultaneous determination of anticancer drugs in human fluids.

In the current work, two eco-friendly analytical methods based on capillary electrophoresis (CE) and reversed phase liquid chromatography (RPLC) were developed for simultaneous determination of the most commonly used anticancer drugs for Hodgkin's disease: methotrexate (MTX), vinblastine, chlorambucil and dacarbazine. A background electrolyte (BGE) of 12.5 mmol/L phosphate buffer at pH 7.4 and 0.1 µmol/L 1-butyl-3-methyl imidazolium bromide (BMImBr) ionic liquid (IL) was used for CE measurements at 250 nm detection wavelength, 20 kV applied voltage and 25 °C. The rinsing protocol was significantly improved to reduce the adsorption of IL on the interior surface of capillary. Moreover, RPLC method was developed on α-1-acid glycoprotein (AGP) column. Mobile phase was 10 mmol/L phosphate buffer at pH 6.0 (100% v/v) and flow rate at 0.1 mL/min. As AGP is a chiral column, it was successfully separated l-MTX from its enantiomer impurity d-MTX. Good linearity of quantitative analysis was achieved with coefficients of determinations (r(2) ) >0.995. The stability of drugs measurements was investigated with adequate recoveries up to 24 h storage time under ambient temperature. The limits of detection were <50 and 90 ng/mL by CE and RPLC, respectively. The using of short-chain IL as an additive in BGE achieved 600-fold sensitivity enhancement compared with conventional Capillary Zone Electrophoresis (CZE). Therefore, for the first time, the proposed methods were successfully applied to determine simultaneously the analytes in human plasma and urine samples at clinically relevant concentrations with fast and simple pretreatments. Developed IL-assisted CE and RPLC methods were also applied to measure MTX levels in patients' samples over time.

Use of short chain alkyl imidazolium ionic liquids for on-line stacking and sweeping of methotrexate, flinic acid and folic acid: their application to biological fluids.

Methotrexate (MTX) is widely used for the treatment of many types of cancer. Folinic acid (FNA) and folic acid (FA) were usually simultaneously supplemented with MTX to reduce the side effects of a folate deficiency. This study, for the first time, included on-line sample preconcentration by stacking and sweeping techniques under reduced or enhanced electric conductivity in the sample region using short chain alkyl imidazolium ionic liquids (ILs) as micelle forming agents for analyte focusing. Both analyte focusing by micelle collapse (AFMC) and sweeping-MEKC had been investigated for the comparison of their effectiveness to examine simultaneously MTX, FNA and FA in plasma and urine under physiological conditions. In sweeping-MEKC, the sample solution without micelles was hydrodynamically injected as a long plug into a fused-silica capillary pre-filled with phosphate buffer containing 3.0 mol/L of 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium bromide (BMIMBr). Using AFMC, the analytes were prepared in BMIMBr micellar matrix and hydrodynamically injected into the phosphate buffer without IL micelles. The conductivity ratio between BGE and sample (γ, BGE/sample) was optimized to be 3.0 in sweeping-MEKC and 0.33 in AFMC resulting the adequate separation of analytes within 4.0 min. To reduce the possibility of BMIMBr adsorption, an appropriate rinsing protocol was used. The limits of detection were calculated as 0.1 ng/mL MTX, 0.05 ng/mL FNA and 0.05 ng/mL FA by sweeping-MEKC and 0.5 ng/mL MTX, 0.3 ng/mL FNA and 0.3 ng/mL FA by AFMC. The accuracy was tested by recovery in plasma and urine matrices giving values ranging between 90 and 110%. Both stacking and sweeping by BMIMBr could be successfully used for the rapid, selective and sensitive determination of pharmaceuticals in complex matrices due to its fascinating properties, including high conductivity, good thermal stability and ability to form different types of interactions by electrostatic, hydrophobic, hydrogen bonding and π-π interactions. In sweeping-MEKC, the using of BMIMBr enhanced the γ factor, k retention factor and the injected amount of sample. Consequently, this technique offers particular potential for higher sensitivity by giving 22- and 5-fold sensitivity enhancement factors (SEFs) of MTX compared to CZE and AFMC, respectively.

Effect of disorder on the optical properties of colloidal crystals.

Colloidal crystals offer a promising route for the formation of three-dimensional photonic crystals. The primary constraint in working with these materials is the disorder present in these self-assembled materials. Sphere vacancies, line dislocations, and random position errors all lead to a degradation in the optical properties. It is important to characterize these effects so as to guide further developments in colloidal crystal optics. Here, we report a systematic and quantitative study of disorder in colloidal crystals with visible diffractive properties. Using optical spectroscopy and digital imaging we have correlated several measures of structural disorder with variations in the transmissive and reflective optical properties. We observe a critical size distribution above which rapid deterioration of the lowest stop band is observed. Below this critical size distribution, we observe excellent optical quality, nearly independent of the size distribution. Single sphere vacancies also increase in crystals formed from more polydisperse spheres. The primary effect of this type of defect is to increase the broadband diffuse scattering.