Graphene quantum dots functionalized β-cyclodextrin and cellulose chiral stationary phases with enhanced enantioseparation performance.

Graphene quantum dots (GQD) functionalized β-cyclodextrin (β-CD) and cellulose silica composites were first prepared and applied in HPLC as chiral stationary phases (CSP) to investigate the effect of GQDs on chiral separation. Through comparing the enantioseparation performance of GQDs functionalized β-CD or cellulose CSPs and unmodified β-CD or cellulose CSPs, we found GQDs enhanced the enantioseparation performance of nature β-CD, β-CD-3,5-dimethylphenylcarbamate derivative and cellulose-3,5-dimethylphenylcarbamate derivative. Molecular modeling was applied to understand and theoretically study the enhancement mechanism of GQDs for enantioseparation. According to molecular simulation results, GQDs provide extra interactions such as hydrophobic, hydrogen bond and π-π interaction when chiral selector interacts with enantiomers, which enhances the chiral recognition ability indirectly. The molecular simulation results showed a good agreement with the experimental results. Our work reveals the enhancement performance of GQDs for chiral separation, it can be expected that GQDs-based chiral composites and chiral GQDs have great prospect in chiral separation and other research fields such as asymmetric synthesis, chiral catalysis, chiral recognition and drug delivery.