ABSTRACT. Commercial (S)-naproxen was racemized under strong basic condition. After checking the peak position of (R)-and (S)-naproxen by analysis the recemized naproxen, optical purity of 19 commercialized naproxens sold in 2013 in Korea were examined by chiral HPLC. The Chiralcel OD-H column, ChiralHyun-LE(S)-1 column and LUX-Cellulose-1 column were used as chiral stationary phases and the mixed eluent of hexane:isopropanol:acetic acid as 100:1:0.1 was used as a mobile phase with a flow rate of 1.0 mL/min. Each data was obtained from an average value of at least three different experiments for each sample and the relative standard deviation of them appeared very small. The average optical purity values obtained from three different chiral columns were very similar and the total average optical purity value (99.32%) of nineteen commercialized naproxens used in this study were larger than those of three years ago (98.17%).

The optical purity of 11 commercial dexibuprofens and 7 ibuprofens sold in Korea in 2013 were examined by chiral HPLC. The Chiralcel OD-H column and LUX-Cellulose-1 column were used as chiral stationary phases and the mixed eluent of hexane:isopropanol:acetic acid as 100:1:0.1 was used as a mobile phase with a flow rate of 1.0 mL/min. Each data was obtained from an average value of at least three different experiments for each sample and the average value of relative standard deviation of them appeared very small, 0.19%. Average optical purity value (97.5%) of eleven commercial dexibuprofens used in this study were smaller than those of 9 years ago (99.2%), but larger than four years ago (95.6%). Enantiomeric ratios of (R)-and (S)isomers of seven ibuprofen samples used in this experiment were achieved at about 50:50 which was different with the result (44:56) from four years ago.