The safety and regulation of natural products used as foods and food ingredients.

The use of botanicals and dietary supplements derived from natural substances as an adjunct to an improved quality of life or for their purported medical benefits has become increasingly common in the United States. This review addresses the safety assessment and regulation of food products containing these substances by the U.S.

Topical drug classification.

Current definitions of lotions, gels, creams and ointments vary depending on literature source, market history or traditional use. This often leads to confusion when deciding which dosage form to prescribe and/or purchase. The existing classification of topical dosage forms needs to be re-examined to ensure that definitions for different dosage forms are based on consistent scientific principles and that dosage forms can be distinguished from one another.

Reproducibility of the separation of astaxanthin stereoisomers on Pirkle covalent L-leucine and D-phenylglycine columns.

The reproducibility of the separation of astaxanthin stereoisomers on columns packed with Pirkle covalent L-leucine chiral stationary phase (CSP) was examined by comparing six columns purchased from the same manufacturer. Differences were found even for columns packed with CSP from the same lot. The reproducibility of columns packed with Pirkle covalent D-phenylglycine CSP was also examined by comparing columns purchased from the same manufacturer as well as from different manufacturers.

Rapid liquid chromatographic method to distinguish wild salmon from aquacultured salmon fed synthetic astaxanthin.

Analytical methods are needed to determine the presence of color additives in fish. We report a liquid chromatographic (LC) method developed to identify the synthetic form of the color additive astaxanthin in salmon, based on differences in the relative ratios of the configurational isomers of astaxanthin. The distributions of configurational isomers of astaxanthin in the flesh of wild Atlantic and wild Pacific salmon are similar, but significantly different from that in aquacultured salmon.

A chiral HPLC method for the simultaneous separation of configurational isomers of the predominant cis/trans forms of astaxanthin.

We report an HPLC method that allows the simultaneous separation of configurational isomers of the predominant cis/trans forms of astaxanthin. The configurational isomers of the all-trans-, and most of the configurational isomers of the 9-cis-, 13-cis- and 15-cis-astaxanthin were separated on a Sumichiral OA-2000 column, which is manufactured and packed in Japan with a Pirkle covalent D-phenylglycine chiral stationary phase (CSP). The large separation of the cis isomers from the all-trans isomers that we report here ensure the suitability of this method for the routine determination of the ratio of the configurational isomers of all-trans-astaxanthin.