Potentiometric determination of octanol-water and liposome-water partition coefficients (log P) of ionizable organic compounds

The logarithm of the octanol-water partition coefficient, log P, is a key physicochemical property for both pharmaceutical drugs and agrochemicals. It is also required by legislation as part of the physicochemical properties profile for high volume production chemicals. This Letter describes a simple method for determining log P values (over a wide range from −0.8 to 5.3) for 12 organic weak acids and bases using potentiometric titrations, with octanol or phosphatidyl choline liposomes as the partitioning medium. Such titrations take comparatively little time (about 30-45 min per titration), are easy to implement, and can be carried out with an inexpensive laboratory titrator.