Rapid analysis of clenbuterol, salbutamol, procaterol, and fenoterol in pharmaceuticals and human urine by capillary electrophoresis

Capillary electrophoresis (CE) with UV detection for the simultaneous and short-time analysis of clenbuterol, salbutamol, procaterol, fenoterol is described and validated. Optimized conditions were found to be a 10 mmol l−1 borate buffer (pH 10.0), an separation voltage of 19 kV, and a separation temperature of 32 °C. Detection was set at 205 nm. Under the optimized conditions, analyses of the four analytes in pharmaceutical and human urine samples were carried out in approximately 1 min. The interference of the sample matrix was not observed. The LOD (limits of detection) defined at S/N of 3:1 was found between 0.5 and 2.0 mg l−1 for the analytes. The linearity of the detector response was within the range from 2.0 to 30 mg l−1 with correlation coefficient >0.996.