Abstract
A method based on high performance liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry （HPLC-ESI-MS/MS） was developed for the determination of the potential genotoxic impurity （WHT1408-Q2H） in the bulk drug of crizotinib. An Agilent Eclipse XDB C8 chromatographic column （150 mm×4.6 mm， 3.5 µm） was used for chromatographic separation. The mobile phases were 0.1% formic acid aqueous solution and 0.1% formic acid acetonitrile solution at a flow rate of 0.4 mL/min. The column temperature was maintained at 40 ℃ and the sample size was 5 μL. In the mass spectrometry section， the electrospray positive ion （ESI(+)） mode with multiple reaction monitoring （MRM） scanning was adopted. The accurate mass of the ［M+H］(+) parent ion of WHT1408-Q2H was m/z 205.3， and the accurate mass of the extracted fragment ion was m/z 121.0. The results of methodological validation demonstrated that the established method exhibited excellent specificity. The peak area and mass concentration of WHT1408-Q2H exhibited a good linear relationship within the range of 2-40 ng/mL， with a correlation coefficient （r） of 0.999 9. The limit of detection （LOD） and limit of quantitation （LOQ） for WHT1408-Q2H were 0.396 9 ng/mL and 1.984 6 ng/mL， respectively. The recoveries of WHT1408-Q2H at low， medium， and high levels were in the range of 95.6%-102.7%， while the relative standard deviations （RSDs） were between 0.4% and 0.7%. Finally， the proposed method was successfully applied to analyze three independent batches of the bulk drug of crizotinib. The results revealed that WHT1408-Q2H was not detected in all samples， indicating that the current production process can effectively control the content of this genotoxic impurity. In conclusion， the developed HPLC-ESI-MS/MS method is highly specific， sensitive， and simple， making it suitable for the stringent quality control of WHT1408-Q2H in the bulk drug of crizotinib. According to the M7 guideline on genotoxic impurities， this method is capable of accurately quantifying trace amounts of genotoxic impurities and will further ensure compliance with regulatory requirements and safeguard drug safety. Future applications may extend this analytical framework to similar genotoxic impurities assessment in other therapeutic compounds， thereby advancing the field of pharmaceutical impurity profiling and control.