Abstract: A method for the determination of chlorhexidine acetate in disinfectors using capillary electrophoresis (CE) was developed using the following conditions: detection wavelength, 254 nm; applied voltage, 15 kV; uncoated fused silica capillary column, 50 cm×75 μm i.d.; buffer, 15 mmol/L phosphate and acetonitrile (60∶40, v/v). Under the optimum conditions, chlorhexidine acetate in disinfectors was determinated in 4 min. The effects of different parameters, such as buffer component, buffer concentration, buffer pH value and electrophoretic voltage, on the CE analysis of chlorhexidine acetate were studied in detail. The linear range of the proposed method was 0.01-0.10 g/L. The detection limit was 0.004 mg/L. The relative standard deviation (RSD) of absorbance was 3.97% and the RSD of migration time was 2.99%. The spiked recoveries of samples were 91.4%-116.6%. The method was compared with the high performance liquid chromatographic method and the relative error was less than 4.0%. The proposed method was simple, quick and suitable for disinfector analysis.

Key words: chlorhexidine acetate, disinfector , capillary electrophoresis