Simultaneous chiral analysis of amphetamine-type stimulants and ephedrine by capillary electrophoresis coupled to time-of-flight mass spectrometry.

This study focused on the chiral characteristics of methamphetamine seizures in Shanghai for inferring the synthetic pathways of drugs. Capillary electrophoresis coupled to time-of-flight mass spectrometry was used for simultaneous chiral separation of amphetamine-type stimulants and ephedrine, including S(+)-amphetamine/R(-)-amphetamine, S(+)-methamphetamine/R(-)-methamphetamine, (±)-MDA (3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine), (±)-MDMA (3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine), (±)-MDEA (3,4-methylenedioxy-N-ethylamphetamine), d,l-N-ethylamphetamine, methylephedrine/methylpseudoephedrine, and 1S,2R(+)-ephedrine/(-)-ephedrine. The running buffer was 50-mM ammonium formate (pH 2.2 was adjusted by 1-M formic acid) containing 0.26% highly sulfated γ-cyclodextrin as the chiral selector. All enantiomers were well resolved within 40 minutes by capillary electrophoresis at 20 kV in an uncoated fused-silica capillary (50-μm I.D. × 375-μm O.D. × 90-cm length) and detected by micro time-of-flight mass spectrometry. Twenty seized methamphetamine samples were determined by the established method. They were classified into two groups through their chiral characteristics.