Development of two high-performance liquid chromatographic methods for the analysis and characterization of insulin and its degradation products in pharmaceutical preparations

Two high-performance liquid chromatography methods either in reversed-phase or as size exclusion separation mode were developed and validated for the analysis of insulin and its degradation products in pharmaceutical preparations. The results show the reliability of the analytical methods for the intended used. The static and dynamic light scattering were used to characterize the insulin and its derivatives. The absolute molecular weight of human insulin monomer and dimer were 5800 and 12400 Da respectively whereas its z-average root mean square radius were 21.6+/-0.4 and 40.5+/-0.7 nm, respectively. In contrast, the hydrodynamic diameter varied between 2.69 and 5.50 nm, depending of the association behavior of insulin. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.