Use of a microemulsion system to incorporate a lipophilic chiral selector in electrokinetic capillary chromatography

Summary The separation of (1R, 2S) and (1S, 2R)-ephedrine using microemulsion electrokinetic capillary chromatography is reported. The lipophilic chiral selector, (2R, 3R)-di-n-butyl tartrate (0.5% w/w), was introduced into the electrophoretic buffer consisting of 0.6% (w/w) sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) and 1.2% (w/w) 1-butanol in 15 mM tris-hydroxyaminomethane buffer (pH 8.1). The two isomers of ephedrine were separated with excellent resolution.