Capillary electrophoresis: a major advancement in separation technology

Abstract

Capillary electrophoresis (CE) is becoming a powerful tool for the resolution of complex mixtures of analytes. It complements and is, in many ways, orthogonal to high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), the more traditional ‘wet’ separation technique, available in the majority of analytical laboratories. CE can be used to achieve rapid and efficient separations of mixtures of analytes of various sizes, hydrophobicity and states of ionization. The most common modes of operation of CE are open-tubular or free-zone, micellar electrokinetic capillary chromatography (MECC), gel, isotacophoresis and isoelectric focusing (IEF). These modes of operation can be used consecutively simply by changing buffer constituents. The ease of use and structural information obtained from CE is making it an important technique used not only by analysts but also by scientists from other disciplines, such as physical chemists and biochemists. In this article we have outlined the increasing role that CE is now playing in our laboratory and the contribution we have made in the development of CE methodology.