A comparison of vancomycin and sulfated beta-cyclodextrin as chiral selectors for enantiomeric separations of selenoamino acids using capillary electrophoresis with UV absorbance detection.

The enantiomeric separation of three selenoamino acids, D,L-selenomethionine, D,L-selenoethionine and D,L-selenocystine is described. Both sulfated beta-cyclodextrin and vancomycin have been successfully used to separate all enantiomers of the compounds with UV detection. Reproducible separations, in terms of peak area and migration time were obtained using sulfated beta-cyclodextrin with reversed polarity and UV detection. With vancomycin as a chiral selector, reversed polarity was found to be more reproducible than positive polarity in terms of peak migration times.