Determination of clenbuterol in pharmaceutical preparations by reaction with o-phthalaldehyde using a flow-injection fluorimetric procedure

A new procedure for the determination of clenbuterol is proposed using flow -injection and fluorimetric detection. The method is based on the derivatiz ation reaction of the primary amine group with o-phthalaldehyde in the pres ence of 2-mercaptoethanol. The calibration graph based on peak area was lin ear in the range 0.2-5 mu g ml(-1) and the detection limit was 0.06 mu g ml (-1). The method was validated using a reference spectrophotometric procedu re and was applied to the determination of the drug in commercial pharmaceu tical preparations. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.