Stability-Indicating HPLC UV Method for Vitamin D 3 Determination in Solutions, Nutritional Supplements and Pharmaceuticals

Journal of Chromatographic Science, 2016, Vol. 54, No. 7, 1180 1186 doi: 10.1093/chromsci/bmw048 Advance Access Publication Date: 4 April 2016 Article Article Stability-Indicating HPLC UV Method for Vitamin D 3 Determination in Solutions, Nutritional Supplements and Pharmaceuticals Žane Temova and Robert Roškar* Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Ljubljana, Aškercěva cesta 7, Ljubljana 1000, Slovenia *Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. Email: robert.roskar@ffa.uni-lj.si Received 2 April 2015; Revised 23 February 2016 Abstract A simple and fast high-performance liquid chromatography method with UV detection for determination of vitamin D 3 in stability studies as well as in solutions, nutritional supplements and pharmaceuticals was developed. Successful separation of vitamin D 3 from its degradation products was achieved on a Gemini C18 100 3.0 mm column using a mixture of acetonitrile and water (99:1, v/v) as а mobile phase. The method was successfully validated according to the ICH guidelines. The described reversed-phase HPLC method is favorable compared with other published HPLC UV methods because of its stability-indicating nature, short run time (3.3 min) and wide analytical range with outstanding linearity, accuracy and precision. The method was further applied for quantification of vitamin D 3 in selected liquid and solid nutritional supplements and prescription medicines, confirming its suitability for routine analysis. Degradation products, formed under stress conditions (hydrolysis, oxidation, photolysis and thermal degradation), were additionally elucidated by suitable equipment (LC DAD MS) to confirm the stability-indicating nature of the developed method. Introduction Vitamin D 3 (cholecalciferol) is a unique fat-soluble vitamin because it can be obtained by endogenous synthesis. Its bioactive form calcitriol (1,25(OH) 2 -D 3 ) plays an essential role in bone development and the homeostasis of calcium and phosphorus. Severe vitamin D deficiency manifests as rickets in infants and children, and osteomalacia in the elderly (1). Less severe deficiencies have been implicated in a wide variety of diseases, including some types of cancer, allergic diseases, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, etc. (2). In medical practice, vitamin D 3 is typically used from 400 to 1,000 IU/day (0.010 0.025 mg/day). Low vitamin D 3 concentrations in nutrition supplements and prescription medicines, the presence of excipients that might interfere with its determination and its lipophilic nature can lead to various analytical problems in the identification and quantification of the vitamin. HPLC methods offer the best approach to accurate content determination of vitamin D 3 in foods and pharmaceuticals, as well as stability testing. In the last decade, high-performance liquid chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry has become the technique of choice for vitamin D 3 determination in foods, feeds and pharmaceuticals. This technique is especially convenient for quantification of the vitamin D 3 in various complex matrixes and multivitamin mixtures (3 6). The published HPLC UV methods for quality control of pharmaceuticals and nutritional supplements containing vitamin D 3 are quite limited regarding the stability-indicating capabilities (7 15), often have run time longer than 10 min (7, 8, 10 12, 14) and are generally preceded by highly complicated and time-consuming sample preparation such as solid-phase or supercritical fluid extraction (8, 9, 12, 13). The aim of the present report was to develop a simple and fast stability-indicating method for the analysis of vitamin D 3 in stability studies as well as in pharmaceutical preparations using a reversed-phase HPLC method with UV detection. The method that covers the determination of vitamin D 3 in various matrixes was successfully validated according to the International Conference on Harmonization (ICH) guidelines. In addition, liquid and solid nutritional supplements and prescription medicines were analyzed to confirm the adequacy of the method. Degradation products, formed under stress conditions (hydrolysis, oxidation, photolysis and thermal degradation), were additionally elucidated by suitable equipment (LC DAD MS) to confirm the stability-indicating nature of the developed method. The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com 1180

Stability-Indicating HPLC UV Method for Vitamin D 3 Determination 1181 Experimental Reagents and chemicals Vitamin D 3 (98%, CAS No. 67-97-0) and 30% solution of hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2 ) were purchased from Sigma-Aldrich (Steinheim, Germany). Sodium hydroxide (NaOH), hydrochloric acid (HCl), formic acid (HCOOH) and orthophosphoric acid (H 3 PO 4 ) were obtained from Merck (Darmstadt, Germany). Both acetonitrile and methanol of HPLC grade were purchased from Sigma-Aldrich (Steinheim, Germany). Ultra-pure water was obtained through a Milli-Q water purification system A10 Advantage (Millipore Corporation, Bedford, MA, USA). HPLC analysis A high-performance liquid chromatograph Series 1100/1200 (Agilent Technologies, USA), equipped with a diode array detector and a Chem- Station data acquisition system, was used. The chromatographic separation was performed on a reversed-phase Gemini C18 100 3.0 mm, 3 µm particle size column (Phenomenex, USA) at 40 C using acetonitrile water (99:1, v/v) as a mobile phase at a flow rate of 1 ml/min. The injection volume was set between 3 and 50 µl, depending on the type of the preparation. The detection was carried out at 265 nm. LC MS analysis Identification of vitamin D 3 degradation products was carried out on an Agilent Infinity 1290 LC (Agilent Technologies) attached to a 6460 QQQ mass spectrometer (Agilent Technologies) using electrospray ionization (ESI) in positive scan mode from m/z 200 to 500 to confirm the stability-indicative nature of the developed HPLC UV method. In addition, MS MS product ion scans for precursor ions were performed at a collision energy of 15 ev. The operating conditions for MS were as follows: drying gas temperature 275 C, drying gas flow 5 L/min, nebulizer 45 PSI, sheath gas temperature 320 C, sheath gas flow 11 L/min, capillary entrance voltage 4,000 V, nozzle voltage 1,000 V and delta EMV 200 V. The chromatographic conditions were the same as for HPLC analysis, except for the mobile phase. The mixture of methanol and 0.1% formic acid (93:7, v/v) was used instead, as it provides better ionization of vitamin D 3 and its related compounds at comparable retention times. Additionally, a diode array detector was coupled to the LC MS system to obtain support information about the degradation products. Procedure for forced degradation study of vitamin D 3 Forced degradation was performed according to the ICH guidelines Q1A (R2) (16). Each sample was prepared in triplicate. Degradation was initiated by dissolving 50.0 mg of vitamin D 3 in 10.0 ml of methanol and by further dilution (c = 200 mg/l) with various solvents: water (thermal degradation), 0.1 M hydrochloric acid (acidic degradation), 0.1 M sodium hydroxide (basic degradation) and 0.3% and 15% H 2 O 2 (oxidation). All samples were exposed to selected stress conditions for 24 h at 25 and 60 C. Water samples were also exposed to light at room temperature ( photodegradation). After the degradation treatments, the samples were cooled to room temperature, neutralized with NaOH or HCl (if required) and analyzed. Because of the fast degradation in water, stress tests were also conducted using methanol solutions of vitamin D 3. Preparation of solutions for method validation The working standard solution (c = 100 mg/l) was prepared by dissolving accurately weighed 10.0 mg of vitamin D 3 into 100.0 ml methanol in a volumetric flask, each day of the validation. Eight calibration standards were prepared for each standard calibration curve. Appropriate volumes of the working standard solution were pipetted into separate amber vials, diluted to a volume of 1,000 µl with methanol and mixed, resulting in the following concentrations: 0.5, 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50 and 100 mg/l. Three quality control samples at 1.5 (low), 7.5 (medium) and 75 mg/l (high) were prepared by diluting fresh working standard solution with methanol. Assay of commercially available nutritional supplements and prescription medicines Liquid dosage forms The developed method was applied to assay the content of vitamin D 3 in commercial liquid prescription medicines A, B and C (4,000, 20,000 and 2,000 IU/mL, respectively) and one liquid nutrition supplement D (4,000 IU/mL). Three different batches of each preparation were analyzed at least in triplicate. Liquid preparations were directly analyzed, without any sample pretreatment. The injection volume was adjusted according to the content of vitamin D 3 : 5 µl for preparations A, C and D and 3 µl for preparation B. The recovery of the method for liquid forms was determined by spiking the original preparations with approximately the same amount of vitamin D 3, as contained in the preparations, in triplicate (total amount found). Unspiked preparations (original amount) and the methanol standard solution of vitamin D 3 containing the added amount (amount spiked) were separately analyzed. The average recoveries were calculated by the formula: recovery (%) = (total amount found original amount)/amount spiked 100%. Solid dosage forms Three batches of commercially available nutritional supplements from two different producers (preparations E and F) prepared in triplicate were analyzed. The labeled content of vitamin D 3 in both preparations was 400 IU per tablet. The extraction procedure was adapted from Kucukkolbasti et al. (8). Two weighed tablets were added to 2.0 ml of 0.1% orthophosphoric acid into a centrifuge tube and vortexed for 2 min. Subsequently, 8.0 ml of methanol was added. The samples were sonicated for 10 min and again vortexed for 2 min. The samples were then centrifuged for 10 min at 4 C and 5,000 rpm. The clear supernatant was filtered through a 0.45-µm filter prior to HPLC analysis. The injection volume was 50 µl. The recovery studies were performed in the same way as for the liquid preparations. A known amount of vitamin D 3 was added to 2.0 ml of 0.1% orthophosphoric acid, into which two tablets of preparation E or F were further added and subjected to the extraction procedure, as previously described. Unspiked preparations and methanol standard solution of vitamin D 3 containing the added amount were separately extracted and analyzed. Recoveries were calculated using the same formula as for liquid preparations. Results Forced degradation studies The forced degradation study showed that vitamin D 3 is liable to hydrolytic, oxidative, thermal and photolytic conditions. Its degradation was observed at all stress conditions in water samples after 24 h. Thermal degradation of vitamin D 3 resulted in the formation of more degradation products (Figure 1). UV and oxidative degradation resulted in the formation of the same degradation products as after thermal degradation while the alkaline hydrolytic degradation resulted in one additional peak (at 0.8 min). The rate of acid hydrolysis was very rapid

1182 Temova and Roškar and resulted in complete degradation of vitamin D 3 within 1 h. It was observed that in 0.1 M HCl there was no degradation peak product eluted in the chromatogram. Identification of obtained degradation products was performed using a LC MS system coupled with diode array detector. A chromatogram after thermal degradation is shown in Figure 1. Vitamin D 3 eluting at a retention time of 2.6 min has a typical molecular ion [M+H] + at m/z 385.4. The first eluting peak (tr 0.4) belongs to the compound with m/z 325.3 (loss of water and an isopropyl group from vitamin D 3 ). More degradation products can be seen in Figure 1, at retention times from 0.9 to 1.6 min, which result from the oxidation of vitamin D 3 to various hydroxy vitamin D 3 degradation products (OH-vit. D 3 ) with a mass peak at m/z 401.4 [(OH-vit. D 3 )+H] + (increase in molecular weight of 16 compared with vitamin D 3 )or m/z 383.4 which corresponds to further fragmentation of OH-vit. D 3 to [(OH-vit. D 3 )-H 2 O+H] +. Additionally, a product ion scan of m/z 401.4 confirms the tentative structure of hydroxylated vitamin D 3 degradation products (Table I). Because vitamin D 3 undergoes extensive degradation to secondary degradation products in water stress samples, stress samples in methanol were used to obtain relevant degradation products (<15% degradation of the principal peak). Typical chromatograms obtained with the proposed method after thermal, oxidative, acidic and alkaline hydrolysis and photodegradation of vitamin D 3 are shown in Figure 2. Stress samples after thermal and alkaline degradation show comparable chromatograms (Figure 2B), with a single peak for vitamin D 3. Oxidative degradation resulted in complete degradation of vitamin D 3 without any degradation product peak in the chromatogram Figure 1. A chromatogram of the vitamin D 3 sample after thermal degradation in water: (a) fragment of vitamin D 3 and (b d) hydroxy vitamin D 3. (Figure 2C). UV and acidic degradation resulted in the formation of degradation products (Figures 2A and D), which were identified as vitamin D 3 isomers, as they have the same mass ions as vitamin D 3 ([M+H] + = 385.4). Additional confirmation that these degradation products are vitamin D 3 isomers was performed by product ion scan mode, which showed the same fragmentation profiles (Table I). Diode array detection was used to further identify individual isomers. UV spectra of vitamin D 3 and its isomers were recorded from 190 to 400 nm (Figure 3) and found to be consistent with the literature UV spectra of particular isomers (17, 18). The identified degradation products, their elution order, retention times, characteristic absorption maxima, molecular mass information and five most abundant product ions of each particular molecular ion are shown in Table I. Chromatographic peaks were observed for tachysterol D 3, transvitamin D 3 and vitamin D 3, while pre-vitamin D 3 and lumisterol D 3 were identified only after MS analysis. Pre-vitamin D 3 was found in stress samples after thermal degradation, while lumisterol D 3 after photodegradation and acidic hydrolysis. Analytical method validation The method was validated according to the ICH guidelines Q2(R1) in terms of selectivity, linearity, repeatability, precision, accuracy, detection limit (LOD), quantification limit (LOQ) and sample stability (19). Method selectivity was assessed by comparing the chromatograms of vitamin D 3 standard solution and potential solvents, several common excipients found in commercial preparations, such as citric acid, EDTA, sodium hydrogen phosphate, glycerol, propylene glycol, sodium benzoate, methyl- and propylparaben and butylhydroxytoluene as well as some active ingredients such as vitamins A, C, E, ascorbyl palmitate and coenzyme Q10. The selectivity of the method was confirmed (Figure 4) as no interfering peaks were found at the retention time of vitamin D 3. The method was also found selective in the presence of the formed degradation products during the forced degradation study. In addition, the peak purity analysis was determined to confirm that there was no co-elution of any degradation product with the principal peak of vitamin D 3. The peak purity test complied for the peak of vitamin D 3 in all stressed samples and indicated no co-elution of degradation products. Linearity was evaluated based on eight calibration standards in the concentration range from 0.5 to 100 mg/l. The procedure was repeated three times, using different working standard solution, for three consecutive days of the validation. The injection volume during validation was 20 µl. The calibration standards from the second validation day were reanalyzed with variations of the injection volume (5 and 50 µl). Slopes from the obtained calibration lines were comparable with the original slope (99.70 and 100.11%) and between Table I. Identified Vitamin D 3 -Related Compounds Abbreviations a Compound Retention time (min) UV absorption maxima (nm) [M+H] + (m/z) Product ions (m/z) b tachy. Tachysterol D 3 2.28 272, 280, 291 385.4 107.1, 133.1, 159.1, 259.3, 367.4 pre-vit. D 3 Pre-vitamin D 3 2.39 260 385.4 107.1, 133.1, 159.1, 259.3, 367.4 trans. Trans-vitamin D 3 2.43 273 385.4 107.1, 133.1, 159.1, 259.3, 367.4 vit. D 3 Vitamin D 3 2.60 265 385.4 107.1, 133.1, 159.1, 259.3, 367.4 lumi. Lumisterol D 3 3.05 276, 286, 298 385.4 107.1, 135.1, 159.1, 259.3, 367.4 b d Hydroxy vitamin D 3 0.9 1.6 250 401.4 109.1, 175.1, 247.1, 365.3, 383.1 a Abbreviations refer to the peaks as labeled in Figures 1 and 2. b Most abundant product ions.

Stability-Indicating HPLC UV Method for Vitamin D 3 Determination 1183 Figure 2. Chromatograms of vitamin D 3 stress samples in methanol after (A) UV degradation, (B) thermal degradation, same as alkaline, (C) oxidative degradation and (D) acidic degradation. Figure 3. UV spectra of vitamin D 3 and its related compounds: tachysterol D 3, pre-vitamin D 3, trans-vitamin D 3, lumisterol D 3 and hydroxy vitamin D 3. themselves (99.81%). Linearity was determined based on the least-square linear regression. The acceptance criterion for the determination coefficient was R 2 > 0.999. The results for linearity of the method, including determination coefficients, are summarized in Table II. These results indicate that the presented method has excellent linearity. The limit of detection (LOD) and limit of quantification (LOQ) were calculated from the regression lines, using the following equations: LOQ = (10 σ)/s and LOD = (3.3 σ)/s, where σ is the standard deviation of the intercepts and S is the average slope of the calibration curve. The determined LOD and LOQ values were 0.019 and 0.057 mg/l, respectively. Method precision and accuracy were examined in terms of repeatability, intermediate precision and accuracy (intra- and inter-day) during three validation days, based on three different quality control samples covering the whole analytical range. The quality control samples were prepared in triplicate, each day of the validation. Injection repeatability was evaluated on three concentration levels by reinjecting the same quality control sample six times. Method precision, expressed as relative standard deviation (RSD), should be <5% (2% for injection repeatability). Accuracy was presented as ratio (%) between the calculated and the theoretical concentration of vitamin D 3 in samples. The acceptance criterion for accuracy was the interval 95 105%. As shown in Table III, the results are in accordance with the defined acceptance criteria. Sample stability was evaluated for three consecutive days of the validation. The quality control samples were kept in the autosampler at 25 C and analyzed at 0, 6, 24 and 48 h. The presented results (% ± standard error of the mean) are expressed as a ratio between the response at a certain time and the response at time 0. The

1184 Temova and Roškar Figure 4. Representative chromatograms of vitamin D 3 (2.6 min) from (A) standard solution near LOQ concentration (0.1 mg/l), V inj = 20 µl; (B) solid nutritional supplement (1 mg/l), V inj = 50 µl and (C) liquid prescription medicine A (100 mg/l), V inj = 5 µl. Table II. Results Obtained for the Linearity Study Calibration line acceptance limit was 100 ± 5%. The stability of vitamin D 3 after 6, 24 and 48 h in the autosampler at 25 C was 100.07 ± 0.09; 100.02 ± 0.14 and 99.35 ± 0.16%, respectively. Method application: assay of vitamin D 3 in commercial nutrition supplements and prescription medicines The validated method was applied to assay the content of vitamin D 3 in commercial liquid prescription medicines A, B and C, liquid nutrition supplement D and solid nutrition supplements E and F. The results for the average content of vitamin D 3 and the calculated recoveries are presented in Table IV. Discussion Injection volume (µl) Slope Intercept R 2 1 20 51,663 1.8376 0.9999 2 20 49,301 2.7535 1.0000 3 20 50,958 5.6904 1.0000 AV 50,641 2.2021 1.0000 2 5 12,288 (49,152) a 0.9142 1.0000 2 50 123,177 (49,271) a 0.4534 0.9999 a Calculated to an injection volume of 20 µl. The main objective of the study was to establish a simple and fast stability-indicating HPLC UV method, which accurately measures the changes in vitamin D 3 concentration without interference from other degradation products, impurities and excipients. In addition to quantitative analysis of vitamin D 3 in pharmaceutical preparations, such method would be also suitable in stability studies of vitamin D 3. The development of the method was quite challenging due to the highly lipophilic nature of vitamin D 3, which required a unique approach. Several reversed-phase analytical columns, mobile phase compositions (mixtures of methanol and/or acetonitrile with water), injection volumes (3 50 μl), flow rates (0.5 2.0 ml/min) and column temperatures (25 40 C) were tested to optimize the chromatographic peak shape, peak width and separation of vitamin D 3 from its degradation products. Optimal conditions were obtained on a Gemini C18 100 3.0 mm column with a mobile phase consisted of water and acetonitrile in ratio 1:99 (v/v), which resulted in short retention time of vitamin D 3 (2.6 min) and satisfying separation from its nearby eluting acidic and photodegradation products (Figure 2). The obtained retention time was favorable in comparison to other published HPLC UV methods for determination of vitamin D 3, where only one has a comparable retention time (13), two have it up to 10 min (9, 15), while the rest have even longer retention time (7, 8, 10 12, 14). According to the results of forced degradation study, vitamin D 3 was found to be the most prone to degradation under acidic and oxidizing conditions. Methanol solutions of vitamin D 3 were generally more stable than water solutions. Vitamin D 3 is converted to various isomers in a lesser extent: pre-vitamin D 3 by heat, trans-vitamin D 3 and lumisterol D 3 by light and tachysterol D 3 and lumisterol D 3 under acidic conditions. The absence of a peak corresponding to vitamin D 3 after exposure to stress conditions shows that potential degradation products do not interfere with the determination of vitamin D 3. Moreover, the stability-indicating ability of the method was proven as the peak purity test successfully passed the analysis of vitamin D 3 in all stressed samples, confirming the spectral similarity of the principal peak (match factor >0.999). On the basis of the obtained data including also LC MS analyses, it can be concluded that the herein described method is stability-indicating and suitable for the analysis of vitamin D 3 stability in simple nonfood matrices. The optimized method was successfully validated, as all tested parameters met the defined acceptance criteria. Selectivity as one of the crucial validation parameters was extensively evaluated during the

Stability-Indicating HPLC UV Method for Vitamin D 3 Determination 1185 Table III. Average Precision and Accuracy Results (% ± Standard Error of the Mean) Concentration (mg/l) Repeatability (%) Intra-day accuracy (%) Intermediate precision (%) Inter-day accuracy (%) Injection repeatability (%) 1.5 1.34 98.89 0.55 99.54 0.43 7.5 0.79 101.85 2.39 99.24 0.18 75 0.24 101.29 0.37 101.26 0.12 Average 0.79 ± 0.32 100.68 ± 0.91 1.11 ± 0.65 100.01 ± 0.63 0.24 ± 0.09 Table IV. Average Content of Vitamin D 3 in IU ± Standard Error of the Mean (n =3) Preparation Declared content Batch I Batch II Batch III Average content Average recovery (%) A (IU/mL) 4,000 4588 ± 12 4656 ± 21 4659 ± 25 4634 ± 23 98.3 B (IU/mL) 20,000 20,026 ± 132 19,636 ± 82 20,308 ± 56 19,990 ± 194 99.6 C (IU/mL) 2,000 2751 ± 13 2622 ± 11 2509 ± 12 2627 ± 70 100.1 D (IU/mL) 4,000 3934 ± 4 4015 ± 18 4049 ± 5 4000 ± 34 100.0 E (IU/tbl) 400 620 ± 6 636 ± 7 584 ± 7 613 ± 14 99.2 F (IU/tbl) 400 498 ± 13 457 ± 2 494 ± 6 483 ± 13 100.3 forced degradation study and validation. The stability-indicative nature and selectivity of the method were confirmed. Among all tested excipients and active ingredients commonly found in commercial preparations, only vitamin A (in form of retinyl palmitate) eluted after vitamin D 3 (at 9.8 min). Therefore, when analyzing vitamin D 3 preparations that also contain vitamin A palmitate, the run time of the method should be prolonged from 3.3 to 11 min. To broaden the analytical range of the method, calibration standards were reanalyzed with variations of the injection volume (Table II). This correlation enables the analysis of a wide variety of preparations containing vitamin D 3 in various concentrations, which is especially valuable for analysis of preparations with low vitamin D 3 content (Figure 4). The validated method was further applied to assay the content of vitamin D 3 in commercially available pharmaceuticals. Good accuracy in terms of high recoveries and precision (Table IV) confirmed the suitability of the established method for the quantification of vitamin D 3 in liquid (A, B, C and D) and in solid preparations (E and F). The proposed method enables direct determination of vitamin D 3 in various liquid pharmaceutical preparations and nutritional supplements without any pretreatment. It is also applicable for the quantification of vitamin D 3 in solid dosage forms after a simple and rapid pretreatment. Conclusion A fast and simple stability-indicating HPLC UV method for quantification of vitamin D 3 in the presence of its degradation products was developed and validated according to the ICH guidelines. The described reversed-phase HPLC method is favorable compared with other published HPLC UV methods because of its stability-indicating nature, short run time and wide analytical range with outstanding linearity, accuracy and precision. The proposed method allows the determination of vitamin D 3 and its related compounds in a single chromatographic run and is suitable for the analysis of the stability of vitamin D 3. The obtained results from the assay of vitamin D 3 in commercial nutrition supplements and prescription medicines confirmed that the method is appropriate for the routine analysis of various pharmaceuticals. References 1. 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