Eco-Friendly UV Spectrophotometric Method for Evaluation of Marbofloxacin in Tablets: Stability Study

Marbofloxacin (MAR) is an antimicrobial for veterinary use, and it does not have a monograph in an official compendium for the pharmaceutical form in tablets.

In this context, the objective of this work was to develop and validate an effective, eco-friendly, and indicative of stability method by spectrophotometry in the ultraviolet region (UV) for quantitative evaluation of MAR in tablets.

Purified water-ethanol (80:20, v/v) as a diluent, quartz cubette and 296 nm were used.

The method was linear in the range of 3-9 µg/mL (0.9994) with detection and quantification limits of 0.39 and 1.18 µg/mL, respectively, selective in the comparison of standard and sample, precise in intraday (RSD 1.20%), interday (RSD 1.68%), and between analysts (RSD 3.26%) levels, exact with average recovery of 100.39% and robust against small changes in wavelength, diluent concentration, and the use of the ultrasound device. The forced degradation test (sample solutions prepared in 0.1 M HCl, 0.1 M NaOH, and neutral conditions and kept at 60°C during 2 h, and exposure to UV 254 nm lamp at ambient temperature during 2 h) showed that the proposed method is able to assess the susceptibility of MAR.

The method can be reliably applied in routine analysis of MAR in tablets as well as being stable, eco-friendly, effective, accessible, and following the principles of green analytical chemistry.

MAR, an antimicrobial for veterinary use, does not have a monograph in an official compendium for final product evaluation. The use of MAR-based products with inadequate quality can leave residues in foods of animal origin and can also contribute to microbial resistance. So, an ecologically correct and reliable method was developed to evaluate MAR in a final product.