Simultaneous determination of biogenic monoamines in rat brain dialysates using capillary high-performance liquid chromatography with photoluminescence following electron transfer

Simultaneous determination of biogenic monoamines such as dopamine, serotonin, and 3-methoxytyramine in brain is important in understanding neurotransmitter activity. This study presents a sensitive determination of biogenic monoamines in rat brain striatum microdialysates using capillary high-performance liquid chromatography with the photoluminescence following electrontransfer detection technique. Separation conditions were optimized by changing the concentration of an ion-interaction agent and the percentage of an organic modifier. The high concentration of ion-interaction agent enabled the amines as a class to be separated from interfering acids, but also made the separation very long. To shorten the separation time, 10% (v/v) acetonitrile was used as the organic modifier. Eight chromatographic runs during a 3-h period were analyzed in terms of retention times, peak heights, and peak widths. Chromatograms are very reproducible, with less than 1% changes in peak height over 3 h. Typical concentration detection limits at the optimum separation conditions were less than 100 pM for metabolic acids and similar to 200 pM for monoamines. The injection volume of the sample was 500 nL. Thus, the mass detection limits were less than 50 amol for metabolic acids and similar to 100 amol for monoamines. Typical separation time was less than 10 min. To validate the technique, the separation method was applied to the observation of drug-induced changes of monoamine concentrations in rat brain microdialysis samples. Local perfusion of tetrodotoxin, a sodium channel blocker, into the striatum of an anesthetized rat decreased dopamine, 3-methoxytyramine, and serotonin concentrations in dialysates. Successive monitoring of striatal dialysates at a temporal resolution of 7.7 min showed that the injection of nomifensine transiently increased dopamine and 3-methoxytyramme concentrations in rat brain dialysate.