Separation and determination of enkephalin-related peptides by capillary electrophoresis with amperometric detection

A simple, reliable, and reproducible method for separation and determination of five enkephalin-related peptides based on CE with amperometric detection (AD) is described in this paper. A potential of 1.0 V was applied to the carbon disk electrode, which was used as a working electrode in this system. At 15 kV of applied voltage, the five compounds were separated within 18 min in a 20 mmol/L phosphate buffer solution (PBS, pH 7.6) including 2.5% methanol v/v. LOD for five enkephalins were ranged from 6.31 to 54.3 nmol/L. The method was applied successfully to determine the five compounds added in the human cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and the recoveries were in the range of 95.8-98.2%.