A microchip electrophoresis strategy with online labeling and chemiluminescence detection for simultaneous quantification of thiol drugs

An integrated microfluidic device with online labeling and chemiluminescence (CL) detection was developed for the simultaneous quantification of thiol drugs. In this device, the online labeling, electrophoresis separation and CL detection were compactly integrated onto a glass/poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) hybrid microfluidic chip. CL detection was based on the oxidation reaction of N-(4-aminobutyl)-N-ethylisoluminol (ABEI) and o-phthalaldehyde (OPA) labeled thiol drugs with NaBrO. Four thiol drugs including 2-mercaptopropionylglycine (2-MPG), captopril (CP), 6-thioguanine (6-TG) and 6-mercaptopurine (6-MP) were employed as model compounds to examine the utility of the system. It was indicated that the separation and detection of four drugs can be completed within 90 s. Detection limits (S/N = 3) for the thiol drugs tested were in the range of 8.9 × 10−9–13.5 × 10−9 M. The application of the present system was demonstrated by analyzing the thiol drugs in human plasma samples.