Measurement of formaldehyde as dimedone adduct and potential formaldehyde precursors in hard tissues of human teeth by overpressured layer chromatography

Simple, automatic overpressured layer chromatographic methods for the paral lel determination of endogenous formaldehyde in the form of dimedone adduct and potential formaldehyde generators (betaines) in hard tissues of human teeth are described together with an efficient densitometric evaluation. Th ese simple procedures involve the special preparation of teeth and extracti on of formaldehyde, of different binding force in teeth, with methanol cont aining dimedone, and the isolation of betaines with an aqueous solution of methanol. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.