Study on the use of boromycin as a chiral selector in capillary electrophoresis

The first application of boromycin as a chiral selector in capillary electrophoresis is described. Given boromycin's insolubility in water, a non-aqueous background electrolyte based on methanol was used for enantiomeric discrimination of selected chiral primary amines (α-methylbenzylamine, R,S-tryptophanol, R,S-norepinephrine, R,S-octopamine, R,S-p-hydroxynorephedrine and R,S-2-amino-1-phenylethanol). A basic study of experimental conditions including the influence of boromycin concentration, the composition and concentration of background electrolyte and also the influence of different organic solvents was performed. The best separation condition was 75 mM Tris/50 mM boric acid in methanol, pHws 9.0, with a positive separation voltage. The enantiomeric separation of the primary amines was achieved within 14 min with resolution values greater than 1.5 for the majority of the studied analytes.

► Boromycin was successfully utilized as chiral selector in non-aqueous capillary electrophoresis.
► Boromycin allows enantioseparation of selected primary amines.
► Methanol is suitable solvent for enantioseparation of primary amines with boromycin.