A Stability-Indicating UPLC Method for the Determination of Potential Impurities and Its Mass by a New QDa Mass Detector in Daclatasvir Drug Used to Treat Hepatitis C Infection

Abstract

A stability-indicating ultraperformance liquid chromatographic method has been developed for the quantitative determination of degradation products and process-related impurities of daclatasvir in a pharmaceutical dosage form. Chromatographic separation was achieved on a polar Waters ACQUITY BEH phenyl 100 × 2.1 mm, 1.7-μm column using the gradient program consisting of mobile phase A: 0.03 M sodium perchlorate with 0.002 M of 1-octanesulfonic acid sodium salt (pH 2.5 buffer) and mobile phase B: 0.03 M sodium perchlorate with 0.02 M of 1-octanesulfonic acid sodium salt (pH 2.5 buffer) with acetonitrile in the ratio of 20:80% v/v. A flow rate of 0.4 mL/min is maintained under ultraviolet detection at 305 nm. The run time was 15 min, within which daclatasvir, its related impurities and unknown degradants were well resolved. The method was found to produce symmetric and sharp peaks with good separation between process-related impurities and degradation impurities. Samples were subjected to hydrolysis (acid and base), oxidative, photolytic and thermal stress conditions to prove the stability-indicating nature of the method. The unknown degradation products were identified by PDA/QDa mass detector. This mass spectrum reveals protonated molecular ion peaks [M + H]+ at m/z DP1-582.4 in acid and base hydrolyses and m/z DP2-778.5 in peroxide hydrolysis. The method was validated in terms of specificity, precision, linearity, accuracy, limit of detection, limit of quantification and robustness as per ICH guidelines.