ABSTRACT

Ratio derivative spectrophotometric method has been developed for the simultaneous determination of artemisinin and curcumin. The overlapping spectra of both drugs were resolved by making use of the first-derivative of the ratios of their direct absorption spectra. The derivative ratio absorbances of artemisinin and curcumin were measured at λmax 293.17 and λmax 457.0 nm, respectively, for their quantification. Artemisinin and curcumin were determined in the concentration range of 2-10 μg/mL and 1-5 μg/mL, respectively. The method was validated as per the ICH guidelines and accuracy, precision were found to be within acceptable limit. The limits of detection and quantitation were found to be 0.003299 and 0.009997 μg/mL, respectively for artemisinin and 0.006743 and 0.020434 μg/mL, respectively for curcumin. The proposed ratio first derivative spectrophotometric method is novel, rapid, simple, sensitive, accurate, precise and successfully applicable for simultaneous estimation of artemisinin and curcumin in parentral dosage form.