A novel chemiluminescence system for the determination of daidzein and its hydroxyl radical-scavenging capacity

A novel chemiluminescence (CL) system was established for the determinations of daidzein in pharmaceutical preparations and to assess its ability to scavenge hydroxyl radicals. It was shown that a strong CL signal generated when eosin Y was mixed with Fenton reagent was decreased significantly when daidzein was added to the reaction system due to partial scavenging of the hydroxyl radicals in the solution. The extent of decrease in the CL intensity had a good stoichiometric relationship with the daidzein concentration. Based on this, we developed a new method for the determination of daidzein, using a flow‐injection chemiluminescence (FI–CL) technique. Under the optimal conditions, the linear range of daidzein concentration was 8.0 × 10^–8–3.0 × 10^–6 mol/L (R = 0.9982), with a detection limit of 9.0 × 10^–9 mol/L (S:N = 3), and the RSD was 5.8% for 1.0 × 10^–6 mol/L daidzein (n = 11). This method was successfully used in the determination of daidzein in tablets and for evaluation of the hydroxyl radical‐scavenging capacity of daidzein. The possible reaction mechanism of the CL system is discussed. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.