Fluorescamine

Fluorescamine, a heterocyclic dione, reacts with primary amines, amino acids, peptides, and protein to form a fluorescent product. Excess reagent and its degradation products are non-fluorescent. The fluorescence of a solution containing protein plus fluorescamine is equivalent to the quantity of free amine groups present. This is the basic principle of a fluorescent protein assay. Fluorescamine is used as a derivatizing agent for the identification of various compounds used in the pharmaceutical industry, such as oseltamavir, penicillamine, sulfonamide residues, lisinopril, methotrexate, vigabatrin, and gabapentin.

Fluorescamine has been used as a stain to localize granular proteins on the surface of foxtail millet starch as well as protein in foxtail millet flour through confocal scanning laser microscopy (CSLM). It has also been used for photometric determination of para-aminobenzoic acid.

Non-fluorescent reagent that reacts readily under mild conditions with primary amines in amino acids and peptides to form stable, highly fluorescent compounds. Low background due to hydrolysis. Useful for the fluorometric assay of amino acids, protein, and proteolytic enzymes. Effectively blocks newly generated amino termini in protein sequence analyses.