On-line chromatographic pretreatment of samples with varying salt concentrations for capillary electrophoresis.

Various methods are currently under investigation to improve concentration detection limits in capillary electrophoresis (CE). Stacking and isotachophoresis coupled in-line with free-solution electrophoresis are the techniques most frequently used. Samples containing a high and/or varying salt concentration, such as urine and serum, are difficult to handle: usually a significant loss in electrophoretic efficiency is observed compared with samples possessing a low electric conductivity. In the present paper an alternative approach is developed, i.e. a liquid chromatographic (LC)-type of sample pretreatment is coupled on-line with CE. To demonstrate the feasibility of this approach, the separation of three model compounds (benzoates) in water containing up to 400 mM of sodium chloride is studied using a 50 mM berate CE buffer of pH 9.5. The direct injection of samples with high salt concentrations in CE results in peak splitting and/or serious band broadening. These problems are not encountered when using the present LC-CE system. In addition, the detection limits are hardly influenced by the salt concentration of the sample; this underlines the robustness of the system.