Capillary Electrophoresis in the Early Twenty-First Century: New Trends and Relevant Applications (Chemical Engineering Methods and Technology)

Capillary electrophoresis (CE) comprises a family of related separation techniques in which an electric field is used to achieve the separation of components in a mixture. One of the key features of CE is the simplicity of the instrumentation required, and today, these techniques have become powerful analytical tools for high efficiency separation, and the identification of a variety of ionic and neutral compounds. Moreover, the versatility of CE operational modes (capillary zone electrophoresis, micellar electrokinetic capillary chromatography, capillary electrochromatography, capillary isoelectric focusing, isotachophoresis, non-aqueous capillary electrophoresis, etc.) and detection systems (ultraviolet, fluorescence, amperometric, mass spectrometry) make CE useful for applications in many fields such as environmental, food, pharmaceutical, and forensic analysis. The typcial drawback of CE techniques, based on their low sensitivity when dealing with conventional UV-detection, due to their short detection pathways and the short sample volume introduced into the capillary, has been largely resolved not only by using more sensitive detectors like fluorescence, amperometric, or mass spectrometry, but by the employment of both off-line and on-line enrichment procedures. The aim of this present book is to address the state-of-the art of capillary electrophoresis techniques within this early twenty-first century, by reviewing new trends and the most relevant applications described in the literature. Uses in fields such as food, environmental, forensic and biological analysis are addressed by means of relevant application. The scope of this book is intentionally broad and is aimed at worldwide analytical laboratories, both public and private, at acadamic institutions, as well as researchers. About the Author Dr Oscar Núñez studied chemistry at the University of Barcelona where he also received his PhD in 2004. He worked as visiting researcher for half a year in the development of on-line preconcentration methods micellar electrokinetic chromatography (MEKC) at University of Hyogo (Japan) in collaboration with Professor Terabe (father of MEKC technique). Starting from October 2005, he joined Kyoto Institute of Technology (Japan) as a two-year post-doc researcher working with Professor Tanaka developing monolithic silica capillary columns under a fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. In November 2007 he joined again University of Barcelona working in the Chromatography, Capillary Electrophoresis and Mass Spectrometry (CCEMS) research group. Currently, he is a Serra Húnter Professor at Department of Analytical Chemistry since December 2014. He has more than seventy scientific papers and book chapters to his name, and he is editor of one book on LC-MS/MS. He has extensive experience in the development of capillary electrophoresis and liquid chromatography methods coupled to tandem mass spectrometry (CE-MS/MS and LC-MS/MS), as well as sample treatment procedures for environmental and food sample analysis. His major research areas also include the characterization, classification and authentication of natural products in the prevention of frauds.