Liquid-chromatographic determination of 5-S-L-cysteinyl-L-dopa with electrochemical detection in urine prepurified with a phenylboronate affinity gel.

A phenylboronate affinity gel has been investigated for use in the prepurification of urine before "high-performance" liquid chromatography and electrochemical determination of 5-S-L-cysteinyl-L-dopa. At pH 5.6 this naturally occurring 5-S-cysteinyldopa was adsorbed on a phenylboronate column and was quantitatively eluted with trichloroacetate, pH 3.0. This pretreatment of urine before "high-performance" liquid chromatography produced satisfactory chromatographic separations, and the results were further improved when the purification procedure also included treatment on a cation exchanger. By using 5-S-D-cysteinyl-L-dopa--a diastereomer to 5-S-L-cysteinyl-L-dopa--as an internal standard, we have developed a practical routine method for the quantitative determination of urinary 5-S-L-cysteinyl-L-dopa. The precision (CV = 2.4%) and analytical recovery (96.9%, SD 5.3%) were satisfactory and the results obtained correlated well with a previously described method.