Hydrolytic Stability of Unsubstituted Hydrazones of Aromatic Carbonyl Compounds in Reversed-Phase HPLC

Unsubstituted hydrazones RR′C=NNH 2 are unstable during gas chromatographic separation. Testing of their resistance to hydrolysis under reversed-phase HPLC showed that aromatic ketone hydrazones are stable. In contrast, aldehyde hydrazones are only stable in neutral methanol–water systems (in the absence of acidic modifiers). In acetonitrile–water systems containing 0.1% of formic acid, only aromatic ketone hydrazones are stable, while aldehyde derivatives are completely hydrolyzed. This difference in stability must be taken into account in determining other compounds of these classes. To detect the hydrolysis of analytes, we compared the retention indices of the initial carbonyl compounds and hydrazones at different volume ratios of organic modifiers and aqueous phases and different pH values of the eluent, the relative absorbance values of the characterized components A (254/220) = A (254)/ A (220), and the chromatography–mass spectrometric data.