High-performance liquid chromatographic determination of some anthraquinone and naphthoquinone dyes occurring in historical textiles

A reversed-phase HPLC method has been developed for identification and quan titation of nine natural quinone dyes and applied to historical textile fib res. A Purospher RP18e column was used with a convex gradient of methanol i n a mobile phase of 0.1 M aqueous citrate buffer (pH 2.5) and spectrophotom etric diode-array detection at 270 nm. For identification of alizarin, purp urin and xanthopurpurin, occurring together in the madder plant, an isocrat ic method was used with a methanol-0.2 M acetate buffer (pH 4.3) (75:25) as the mobile phase. After an acid extraction of textile fibres and the analy sis of the extracts, alizarin and purpurin were identified and quantitated in three fibres. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.