Development and Validation of a Reversed Phase HPLC Method for Determination of Anacardic Acids in Cashew (Anacardium occidentale) Nut Shell Liquid

Cashew nut shell liquid (CNSL) contains phenolic lipids with aliphatic chains that are of commercial interest. In this work, a chromatographic method was developed to monitor and quantify anacardic acids (AnAc) in CNSL. Samples containing AnAc were analyzed on a high-performance liquid chromatograph coupled to a diode array detector, equipped with a reversed phase C-18 (150 x 4.6mm x 5 mu m) column using acetonitrile and water as the mobile phase both acidified with acetic acid to pH 3.0 in an isocratic mode (80:20:1). The chromatographic method showed adequate selectivity, as it could clearly separate the different AnAc. To validate this method, AnAc triene was used as an external standard at seven different concentrations varying from 50 to 1,000 mu gmL(-1). The Student's t-test and F-test were applied to ensure high confidence for the obtained data from the analytical calibration curve. The results were satisfactory with respect to intra-day (relative standard deviation (RSD) = 0.60%) and inter-day (RSD = 0.67%) precision, linearity (y = 2,670.8x - 26,949, r(2) > 0.9998), system suitability for retention time (RSD = 1.02%), area under the curve (RSD = 0.24%), selectivity and limits of detection (19.8 mu g mg(-1)) and quantification (60.2 mu g mg(-1)). The developed chromatographic method was applied for the analysis of different CNSL samples, and it was deemed suitable for the quantification of AnAc.