Amino Acid Analysis: Aqueous Dimethyl Sulfoxide As Solvent for the Ninhydrin Reaction

Abstract Methyl Cellosolve (the monomethyl ether of ethylene glycol) has been widely used as the organic solvent in ninhydrin reagents for amino acid analysis; it has, however, properties that are disadvantageous in a reagent for everyday employment. The solvent is toxic and it is difficult to keep the ether peroxide-free. A continuing effort to arrive at a chemically preferable and relatively nontoxic substitute for methyl Cellosolve has led to experiments with dimethyl sulfoxide, which proves to be a better solvent for the reduced form of ninhydrin (hydrindantin) than is methyl Cellosolve. Dimethyl sulfoxide can replace the latter, volume for volume, in a ninhydrin reagent mixture that gives equal performance and has improved stability. The result is a ninhydrin-hydrindantin solution in 75% dimethyl sulfoxide-25% 4 m lithium acetate buffer at pH 5.2. This type of mixture, with appropriate hydrindantin concentrations, is recommended to replace methyl Cellosolve-containing reagents in the quantitative determination of amino acids by automatic analyzers and by the manual ninhydrin method.