High-performance liquid chromatographic method for the analysis of N tau-methylhistidine in food, chicken excreta, and rat urine.

A reliable high-performance liquid chromatographic method that utilizes a reversed-phase separation with ion-pairing and post-column fluorescence derivatization for the analysis of N tau-methylhistidine in food, chicken excreta, and rat urine is described. N tau-Methylhistidine in the hydrolyzed sample is first roughly separated from acid and neutral amino acids by an ion-exchange column. The N tau-methylhistidine fraction is then evaporated and the residue is dissolved in the mobile phase (15 mM sodium octane sulfonate in 20 mM potassium phosphate), and subjected to high-performance liquid chromatography.