Abstract:
A study was undertaken' to determine the applicability of gas
liquid chromatography to the simultaneous analysis of sugars and sugar
phosphates from biological samples. A new method of silylation
involving dimethylsulfoxide, hexamethyldisilazane, trimethylchlorosilane
and cyclohexane (1:0.2:0.1:1) which rapidly silylated sugars
and sugar phosphates was developed. Subsequent chromatography on a
5% SE-52 column gave good resolution of the sugar and sugar phosphate
samples. Sugar phosphates decomposed during chromatography and were
lost at the 7 x 10-3 ~mole level. Acidic ethanol extraction of yeast
samples revealed background contamination from the yeast sample, the
culture medium and the silylation reagents which would further limit
the level of detection obtainable with the glc for sugars in biological
samples to the 3 x 10-4 ~mole level.
