An isocratic solvent-free mobile phase HPLC-PDA analysis of clenbuterol and ractopamine

This paper describes a reserved-phase HPLC method for detecting clenbuterol (CB) and ractopamine (RP) using an isocratic solvent-free mobile phase. The separations were performed a Kaseisorb® LC C1-300-5 (100 × 4.6 mm, 5 μm) with 0.05 mol/L octane sulfonic acid mobile phase and a photodiode array detector. The total run time was <5 min. The system suitability was well within the international acceptance criteria. The detection limits were 0.68 ng/mL for CB and 1.24 ng/mL for RP, respectively. A harmless method for simultaneous detecting CB and RP was developed and may be further applied to the quantification in foods.