Critical evaluation of buffering solutions for p K a determination by capillary electrophoresis

Abstract

The performance of the most common and also some other less common CE buffers has been tested for the pK determination of several types of compounds (pyridine, amines, and phenols). The selected buffers cover a pH ranging from 3.7 to 11.8. Whereas some buffers, like acetic acid/acetate, BisTrisH/BisTris, TrisH/Tris, CHES/CHES and CAPS/CAPS can be used with all type of analytes, others like ammonium/ammonia, butylammonium/butylammonia, ethylammonium/ethylammonia, diethylammonium/diethylammonia, and hydrogenphosphate/phosphate are not recommended because they interact with a wide range of compounds. The rest of the tested buffers (dihydrogenphosphate/hydrogenphosphate,MES/MES , HEPES/HEPES, and boric acid/borate) can show specific interactions depending on the nature of the analytes, and their use in some applications should be restricted.