A simple and small-scale sample preparation technique to determine canthaxanthin in hen egg yolk

This paper describes an easy, small-scale method of sample preparation followed by a reversed-phase (RP) high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) for quantifying canthaxanthin (CX) in egg yolk. The egg yolk extract including CX was purified by using a normal-phase InterSep (R)-CN mini-syringe-column as a solid-phase extraction column. HPLC was performed on a C8 column with an isocratic mobile phase and diode array detector. The proposed method was validated by the analyses of spiked egg yolk samples; resulting recoveries (>= 94.5%; RSD <= 2.8%), analytical total time (<1 h/sample), and limit of quantitation (0.5 mu g/g). The decision limit and detection capability were 25.04 and 25.07 mu g/g, respectively. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.