Separation and quantitation of molecular species of plant phosphatidylcholine by high-performance liquid chromatography with flame ionization detection.

A method is described for the direct quantitation of phosphatidylcholine molecular species by reverse phase high-performance liquid chromatography employing flame ionization detection. The method is shown to be applicable to plan phosphatidylcholine. The molecular species are separated with a C18 column eluted in an isocratic mode. Detection by a commercially available flame ionization detector overcomes the problems of detecting underivatized naturally occurring lipids using ultraviolet detectors, and allows direct and rapid mass determination of the resolved molecular species. Detection limits for quantitation are defined.