Recent developments in chiral capillary electrophoresis and applications of this technique to pharmaceutical and biomedical analysis

This paper provides an overview of the current status of chiral capillary e lectrophoresis (CE). The emphasis is placed on the application of CE in chi ral separation of various racemic compounds. During the last two years abou t 280 papers, several review articles, and two entire issues, edited by S. Fanali (Electrophoresis 1999, 20, 2577-2798), and H. Nishi and S. Terabe (J . Chromatogr A 2000, 879, 1-471.) have been devoted to chiral CE. Enantiome ric separations of various compounds, e.g., pharmaceuticals, drug candidate s, drugs and related metabolites in biological fluids, amino acids, di- and tri peptides, pesticides and fungicides, have been performed using differe nt chiral selectors. Native and derivatized cyclodextrins continue to be th e most widely used chiral selectors. Other chiral selectors such as natural and synthetic chiral micelles, crown ethers, chiral ligands, proteins, oli go- and polysaccharides, and macrocyclic antibiotics have also been applied to chiral CE separations.