HILIC continues to gain popularity as more highly polar and ionizable compounds are developed. No exotic solvents are required – mainly acetonitrile and water with buffer. HILIC is a useful option for retaining polar compounds and shows improvements compared to reversed-phase with MS detection. Analysts may be reluctant to try HILIC, but the methods can be designed to be as robust and reproducible as reversed-phase methods. HILIC solves challenging separations and should be appreciated and utilized.
Author: Dr. Stephanie Schuster, Senior Technical Support Scientist, Advanced Materials Technology