Sample aliquots of 159 ml were derivatised in a plastic tube protected from light by adding 1.9 ml of distilled water and 0.4 ml of 1 N NaOH. This mixture was allowed to stand for 1 min and then 100 ml of an o-phthalaldehyde methanolic solution (1 g of o-phthalaldehyde l in methanol) was added. The tube was shaken vigorously, the reaction was allowed to proceed for 4 min and then stopped by adding 0.2 ml of 3 N HCl. The derivatised sample solution was centrifuged for 15 min at 8000 rpm,filtered through 0.2-mm millipore syringe filters (Schleicher and Schuell, FP 030/AS, Ref. 462960, ‘s Hertogensbosch, The Netherlands) and analysed by reversed phase-HPLC (RP-HPLC). Separation was carried out on a C column (Spherisorb 2.5 18 mm ODS; 25 cm 3 4.6 mm internal diameter; Chrom pack, Middelburg, The Netherlands). A 20-ml aliquot of injected sample mixture was eluted isocratically over 20 min with a mixture of acetonitrile (40%,HPLC-grade, LAB-Scan, C2502, Dublin, Ireland) and 50 mM NaH PO solution in millipore water 2 4 (60%). The flow-rate was 0.70 ml min . Detection 21
was done with a continuous flow fluorescence meter (Spectra System Series, Thermo Separation Products,FL 3000, Riviera Beach, Florida, USA) with excitation at l 5 350 nm and emission at l 5 450 nm. Alldeterminations were carried out in triplicate.