Automated fraction collection in capillary electrophoresis

Abstract

In the last few years capillary electrophoresis (CE) has become established alongside high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) as a complementary, powerful separation technique for peptides and proteins. Along with the high speed, low sample requirement and overall lower running costs, a major advantage of CE is its flexibility. On one hand, typical HPLC separation modes, like reversed phase HPLC using differences in the hydrophobicity of components or ion-exchange chromatography using differences in the net charge of components can also be performed by micellar electrokinetic chromatography (MEKC) or capillary zone electrophoresis (CZE), respectively. On the other hand, typical slab gel electrophoresis separation modes like SDS (sodium dodecyl sulfate)—polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) or isoelectric focusing (IEF) can also be carried out by CE as capillary gel electrophoresis (CGE) or capillary isoelectric focusing (CIEF).