SIMULTANEOUS DETERMINATION OF EPSILON-CAPROLACTAM AND EPSILON-AMINOCAPROIC ACID BY HIGH-PERFORMANCE LIQUID-CHROMATOGRAPHY

A high-performance liquid chromatographic method for the simultaneous determination of epsilon-caprolactam and epsilon-aminocaproic acid has been developed. This method uses a silica-based C-18 column and 20% a cetonitrile in 0.02 M orthophosphoric acid as eluent. The peaks are we ll separated and their quantitative determination is done by calibrati on with Sigma grade standards. For a 20 yl sample, the limit of detect ion for epsilon-caprolactam and epsilon-aminocaproic acid is 1 and 100 mg l(-1), respectively. The calibration curves are linear up to 1000 mg l(-1), r(2) = 0.992 for epsilon-caprolactam and r(2) = 0.997 for ep silon-aminocaproic acid. In various effluent streams of nylon-6 indust ry, epsilon-caprolactam, a genotoxic compound, was found as the major pollutant ranging from 351 to 2101 mg l(-1). In order to check the val idity of the method for epsilon-aminocaproic acid, Hemocid(TM) (epsilo n-aminocaproic acid injection) was used as the test sample and it was observed that the experimentally found epsilon-aminocaproic acid conce ntration (1007 mg l(-1)) matched with the expected concentration (1000 mg l(-1)) of the same compound in the injection. To the best of our k nowledge, this is the first report on simultaneous determination of ep silon-caprolactam and epsilon-aminocaproic acid, by high-performance l iquid chromatography.