Chiral ionic liquids as chiral selectors for separation of tryptophan enantiomers by ligand exchange chromatography

Chiral ionic liquids (CILs) containing imidazolium cations and L-Proline (L-Pro) anions were applied as chiral selector to separate tryptophan (Trp) enantiomers on a C18 column by ligand exchange chromatography. Several factors influencing Trp enantiomers separation, such as alkyl chain length of CILs, concentrations of Cu2+ and CILs, pH of the mobile phase, flow rate, organic solvent and temperature, were studied. Under the optimal conditions, the Trp enantiomers could be successfully separated within 21 min with the resolution of 2.30. At the same time, some thermodynamical parameters were obtained. The experimental results show that the enthalpy values of the Trp enantiomers are negative, indicating that the separation process is exothermic. And the enthalpy values of D-Trp are larger than those of L-Trp, which indicates that L-Trp could form more stable ternary complexes with tryptophan enantiomers.

Separation of tryptophan enantiomers with molecularly imprinted polypyrrole electrode column

In this study,we have fabricated molecularly imprinted polypyrrole(PPy) packed electrode columns and investigated their effects on separation of tryptophan(Trp) enantiomers by using potential control.The results indicate that the imprinted PPy electrode columns could efficiently enhance the L-Trp uptake and separate Trp enantiomers effectively,implying the great potential for the enantioselective recognition of other amino acids enantiomers.

Direct detection of tryptophan enantiomers in urine using the chiral recognition of cyclodextrin by capillary electrophoresis

Racemic tryptophan was separated with resolution 1.3 by CE. In 10 mM H2PO4 containing triethanolamine salt of pH2.8 ahnost saturated α-CD was used as chiral reagent. For the first time L- and D-tryptophan enantiomers in human urine can be detected in 20 minute without pretreatment.