Simultaneous determination of biogenic amines, their precursors and metabolites in a single brain of the cricket using high-performance liquid chromatography with amperometric detection.

An analytical procedure has been developed for the simultaneous determination of biogenic amines, their precursors and metabolites by high-performance liquid chromatography with amperometric electrochemical detection. Following careful adjustment of various factors involved in the separation efficiency, reversed-phase chromatography with an ion-pairing technique gave simultaneous separation of nineteen biogenic amines and related substances. Peak identification was confirmed by comparison with hydrodynamic voltammograms. The method was sensitive enough to detect each substance in the picomole range. The procedure was applied to quantitate the amount of biogenic amines in a single brain of the cricket.