Development and validation of a TLC-densitometric method for the simultaneous quantitation of strychnine and brucine from Strychnos spp. and its formulations

A simple, sensitive, and specific thin-layer chromatography densitometric method has been developed for the simultaneous quantitation of strychnine and brucine. These two marker compounds are quantitated in the seeds of Strychnos nux-vomica, Strychnos ignatii, and its formulations. The method involves densitometric evaluation of strychnine and brucine after resolving it by high-performance TLC on silica gel plate with toluene-ethyl acetate-diethyl amine-methanol (7:2:1:0.3 v/v) as the mobile phase. The method is validated for precision (interday and intraday), repeatability, and accuracy. The relationship between the concentration of standard solutions and the peak response is linear within the concentration range of 160 to 480 ng/spot for strychnine and 80 to 480 ng/spot for brucine. Instrumental precision is found to be 0.54 and 0.78 (% CV), and repeatability of the method is 1.01 and 1.06 (% CV) for strychnine and brucine, respectively. Accuracy of the method is checked by recovery study conducted at three different levels and the average percentage recovery is found to be 99.13% for strychnine and 100.16% for brucine. The proposed HPTLC method for the simultaneous quantitation of strychnine and brucine is found to be simple, precise, specific, sensitive, and accurate, and it can be used for routine quality control of raw material of Strychnos spp. It also can be applied in quantitating any of these marker compounds in other formulations.