Recent developments in electrophoretic separations on microfluidic devices

Research combining the areas of separation science and microfluidics has gained popularity, driven by the increasing need to create portable, fast, and low analyte-consumption devices. Much of this research has focused on the developments in electrophoretic separations, which use the electrokinetic properties of analytes to overcome many of the problems encountered during system scale-down. In addition, new physical phenomenon can be exploited on the microscale not available in standard techniques. In this study, the innovative developments, including electrophoretic concentration, sample preparation/conditioning, and separation on-chip are reviewed, along with some introductory discussions, from January 2008 to July 2010.