A New Spectrofluorimetric Method for Determination of Trace Amounts 5-Hydroxytryptamine in Human Urine and Serum

Development of a new highly sensitive serotonin sensor based on green synthesized silver nanoparticle decorated reduced graphene oxide

Electrochemical detection of serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine, 5-HT) is proposed for the first time using a cost-effective and eco-friendly nanocomposite of AgNPs and rGO which is synthesized through an in situ green reduction process using rosemary leaf extract. The synthesized nanocomposite and the elaborate thin layers have been characterized using UV-Vis, FTIR, TEM, and EIS. The sensitivity of the developed sensor was evaluated by differential pulse voltammetry. The peak current measured at a voltage of 420 mV (vs. Ag/AgCl) increased linearly in the 0.1 nM to 100 µM concentration range. A very low limit of detection of 78 pM compared to those in recent studies reported in the literature was obtained. The innovative approach was successfully applied to the determination of serotonin in spiked artificial urine samples.

Simple and reliable serotonin assay in human serum by LC-MS/MS method coupled with one step protein precipitation for clinical testing in patients with carcinoid tumors

Serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine, 5-HT) is readily secreted in patients with carcinoid tumors, especially arising from the midgut. Although serotonin assay in human plasma or whole blood has been extensively studied, serotonin assay in human serum by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) has received much less attention. In this study, a simple and reliable LC-MS/MS method based on one step protein precipitation for sample pretreatment was developed for clinical assay of serum serotonin. Namely, 150 μL of serum was mixed with 50 μL of internal standard (IS) and 200 μL of 4 wt.% 5-sulfosalicylic acid (SSA) solution for protein precipitation. The supernatant after centrifugation was analyzed directly without further treatment. This method was validated for consistent linearity from 0.94 to 240 ng/mL with CVs ≤ 11.7%, good recovery in the range of 87.5%-104%, excellent analyte stability and low carryover. No obvious matrix effect was observed. Intra- and inter-day imprecision were below 8.03% and 11.5% respectively. Dilution linearity was verified with satisfying linearly dependent coefficients (r² = 0.9937). The reference interval of serotonin was established from 126 results derived from subjects without carcinoid tumors. Therefore, apart from development of a serum serotonin assay by the LC-MS/MS method, the reference interval (RI) of 5-HT has also been established for clinical testing in patients with carcinoid tumors. In addition, this method has been successfully used in our laboratory, indicating that this robust LC-MS/MS assay with simple sample preparation and short analysis time could offer inspiring potential for clinical testing of 5-HT in routine clinical laboratories.

A novel optical biosensor for direct and selective determination of serotonin in serum by Solid Surface-Room Temperature Phosphorescence

This paper describes a novel biosensor which combines the use of nanotechnology (non-woven nanofibre mat) with Solid Surface-Room Temperature Phosphorescence (SS-RTP) measurement for the determination of serotonin in human serum. The developed biosensor is simple and can be directly applied in serum; only requires a simple clean-up protocol. Therefore it is the first time that serotonin is analysed directly in serum with a non-enzymatic technique. This new approach is based on the covalent immobilization of serotonin directly from serum on a functional nanofibre material (Tiss®-Link) with a preactivated surface for direct covalent immobilization of primary and secondary amines, and the subsequent measurement of serotonin phosphorescent emission from the solid surface. The phosphorescent detection allows avoiding the interference from any fluorescence emission or scattering light from any molecule present in the serum sample which can be also immobilised on the nanofibre material. The determination of serotonin with this SS-RTP sensor overcomes some limitations, such as large interference from the matrix and high cost and complexity of many of the methods widely used for serotonin analysis. The potential applicability of the sensor in the clinical diagnosis was demonstrated by analysing serum samples from seven healthy volunteers. The method was validated with an external reference laboratory, obtaining a correlation coefficient of 0.997 which indicates excellent correlation between the two methods.

Validated spectrofluorimetric method for determination of selected aminoglycosides

New, sensitive, and selective spectrofluorimetric method was developed for determination of three aminoglycoside drugs in different dosage forms, namely; neomycin sulfate (NEO), tobramycin (TOB) and kanamycin sulfate (KAN). The method is based on Hantzsch condensation reaction between the primary amino group of aminoglycosides with acetylacetone and formaldehyde in pH 2.7 yielding highly yellow fluorescent derivatives measured emission (471 nm) and excitation (410 nm) wavelengths. The fluorescence intensity was directly proportional to the concentration over the range 10-60, 40-100 and 5-50 ng/mL for NEO, TOB and KAN respectively. The proposed method was applied successfully for determination of these drugs in their pharmaceutical dosage forms.

Chemical sensing of neurotransmitters

This review focuses on the chemosensors for neurotransmitters published for the last 12 years, covering biogenic amines (dopamine, epinephrine, norepinephrine, serotonin, histamine and acetylcholine), amino acids (glutamate, aspartate, GABA, glycine and tyrosine), and adenosine.

Two validated spectrofluorometric methods for determination of gemifloxacin mesylate in tablets and human plasma

Two new, sensitive, and selective spectrofluorometric methods were developed for the determination of gemifloxacin mesylate (GFX) in tablets and spiked human plasma. Method A was based on measurement of the enhanced fluorescence spectral behaviour of GFX in a sodium dodecyl sulphate (SDS) micellar system. In aqueous solution of acetate buffer pH 5.5, the fluorescence intensity of GFX was greatly enhanced about tenfold in the presence of SDS. The fluorescence intensity was measured at 402 nm after excitation at 274 nm. Method B was based on Hantzsch condensation reaction between the primary amino group of GFX with acetylacetone and formaldehyde in acetate buffer of pH 3.5 yielding a highly yellow fluorescent derivative. The reaction of GFX with acetylacetone-formaldehyde system solution resulted in bathochromic shift of both emission (476 nm) and excitation (420 nm) wavelengths. The fluorescence intensity was directly proportional to the concentration over the range 10–1000 ng/ml and 100–2000 ng/ml for method A and B, respectively. The proposed methods were applied successfully for determination of GFX in its tablets and spiked plasma. Therefore, these methods can be considered of real interest for reliable and practical quality control analysis of GFX.