Separation and determination of clotrimazole, methylparaben and propylparaben in pharmaceutical preparation by micellar electrokinetic chromatography

In this study, micellar electrokinetic chromatography (MEKC) method was developed for the determination of clotrimazole (CLO), methylparaben (MP) and propylparaben (PP) in a pharmaceutical preparation. Separation was carried out in a fused silica capillary (60 cm × 75 μm i.d.) at 25 kV with UV detection at 212 nm. Optimized background electrolyte (BGE) was 15 mM phosphate buffer (pH 7.2) containing 30 mM sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) as a surfactant. Rectilinear calibration ranges were 50–500 mg l−1 for CLO, 10–100 mg l−1 for MP and 2.5–25 mg l−1 for PP. The total analysis time was <12 min.