High‐Throughput Multi‐Capillary Electrophoresis

ABSTRACT

The potential of multi‐capillary electrophoresis (CE) for high‐throughput analysis of legacy CE applications was investigated by optimisation of the separation of six pharmaceutical compounds on a single‐capillary instrument, followed by transference of the method to an eight‐capillary BioPhase 8800 system from SCIEX. Multi‐CE had superior performance, allowing construction of calibration curves in a single run, and a five‐fold reduction of run time per sample, improved linearity, accuracy and limits of detection. Method transfer from the single‐capillary system required minor instrumental parameter adjustments using the same background electrolyte. The potential of multi‐CE was shown via quantification of caffeine in a variety of energy drinks, demonstrating broad applicability where high‐throughput and rapid analyses are desirable.