Determination of Papaverine by Biotin‐Avidin Amplified ELISA

Abstract

Papaverine [1‐(3,4‐dimethoxybenzyl)‐6,7‐dimethoxyisoquinoline; PAP] is one of the most important alkaloids among the naturally occurring opium alkaloids. This work developed an indirect competitive enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for PAP based on the biotin‐avidin amplification system. The linear range of the calibration curve and the limit of detection (defined as three times of the blank) were 0.02–1000 ng/mL and 0.008 ng/mL, respectively. The established method was successfully applied to determining the concentration of PAP in the pericarpium papaveris with the recoveries between 88% and 120%. It was proved to be a highly sensitive and practical method for trace PAP detection compared with the existing gas chromatography‐mass spectrometry (GC‐MS) or high‐performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) methods.

Keywords:

• Papaverine
• Biotin
• Avidin
• ELISA
• Polyclonal antibody
• Pericarpium papaveris

Acknowledgments

We thank the Ministry of Science and Technology of People's Republic of China for the financial support under the “Tenth‐Five” Key Project (No. 2001BA804 A21).