Green HPLC-UV method for the simultaneous analysis of enalapril, enalaprilat and diketopiperazine in pharmaceutical formulation

The official analytical method for assay and impurities in enalapril maleate tablets, as described in pharmacopoeial monographs, relies on HPLC-UV with a C8 column (250 × 4.6 mm; 5 µm) and a mobile phase consisting of acetonitrile and phosphate buffer pH 2.2 (25:75 v/v). In order to reduce analysis time, cost, and environmental impact, an optimised method was developed. The chromatographic column was replaced by a C18 (100 × 4.6 mm; 3.5 µm), as the reduced particle size and shorter column length allowed for faster separations while maintaining efficiency. In addition, the mobile phase was modified to ethanol and phosphate buffer pH 2.2 (30:70 v/v), since ethanol has a lower environmental impact compared with acetonitrile. Relative to the official method, the optimised procedure shortened the chromatographic run by approximately 8 minutes, reduced organic solvent consumption by 17.1 mL (equivalent to US$ 0.40) per run, and achieved better scores in the NEMI, GAPI, Eco-Scale (84 vs. 89), and AGREE (0.57 vs. 0.78) assessment tools. During validation, the linear range for enalapril was established at 140–260 µg mL⁻¹, and the method proved capable of simultaneously quantifying enalapril, enalaprilat, and diketopiperazine with 80.0 and 67.5 score for BAGI and RAPI metric, respectively.

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