Determination of trehalose by ion chromatography and its application to a pharmacokinetic study in rats after intramuscular injection

An ion chromatography method was established for detecting trehalose in rat plasma. The samples were analyzed using a CPMA1 column (250 × 4.0 mm, Thermo) with 120 mm NaOH as eluent at a flow rate of 0.7 mL/min. The standard curve was y = 1.4316x - 0.0654 (R = 0.9992), and the linear range was 0.2-10 mg/L. The relative standard deviations of within-run and between-run precisions at low, medium and high concentrations were within 0.96-8.33%, and the accuracy was within 80.09-114.99%. The method was verified by rigorous methods, and applied to a pharmacokinetic study in rats after intramuscular injection (20 mg/kg, n = 6). The pharmacokinetic parameters, specifically AUC_0-t , AUC_0-∞ , t_1/2 , C_L and V_d , were 15.542 ± 3.122 mg h/L, 15.599 ± 3.141 mg h/L, 0.73 ± 0.347 h, 1.331 ± 0.293 L/h kg and 1.403 ± 0.735 L/kg, respectively. The developed ion chromatography method met the requirements of biological sample measurement, and will be helpful for future pharmacological studies of trehalose.